Disclaimer: I hold none of the rights to the TV show Buffy the Vampire Slayer, or any of its characters and locations. I am writing this solely for the entertainment of others and no money whatsoever has, or ever will exchange hands regarding this story. If you are interested in posting any part of this fic for whatever reason, please email me for permission first at: rab_ruth@darkfox.freeserve.co.uk
P.S. I don't own the Buffy font either, I'm just using it for effect (if it works at all!).
Chapter 1:
PreludesIt was early morning in Sunnydale, and the sun was starting to creep over the horizon, signalling the coming end to the darkness in which the town's undead community thrived. In one house on Revello Drive, a young red-haired woman was tossing and turning in her sleep, haunted by nightmarish images of her best friend suffering in torment in a hellish other reality.
Willow woke with a start, sitting upright in the double bed, her eyes scanning the room for a moment as she tried to gain her bearings. It was just a dream, she realised, looking at the clock at her bedside.
6:08. Still too early, now get back to sleep. With that thought, she laid her head on the pillow once more and tried to get back to sleep. However, the after-images of the nightmare still preyed on her mind.
But what if it wasn't just a dream? she thought. Buffy really could be in hell…
Willow tried both physically and mentally to shake that notion away, but it stuck there, like a thorn. She couldn't get rid of the thought: her best friend was dead. Killed by mystical forces. That meant her soul might not be where it should be and there was nothing she could do about it. But then her brow crinkled as something registered in her mind.
Killed by mystical forces? She repeated the thought. That means something, I remember reading it in a book…
Then inspiration hit and a plan began to form. Forgetting all thoughts of sleep she sat up in her bed. Being careful not to disturb her sleeping girlfriend beside her, Willow slipped out of her bed and slid her feet into her slippers before standing ever so carefully and tiptoeing towards the door. Opening it slowly, so as not to make a sound, she squeezed through it and made her way quietly down the corridor. Stopping just outside Dawn's room, Willow opened the door a crack to make sure the young girl was still sleep. She was sleeping, but as fitfully as Willow had been.
Although momentarily saddened to see the young girl so troubled in her sleep, Willow's face immediately took on a new level of determination: if she hadn't been entirely sure about looking for a spell before, she was now. With her 'resolve face' firmly set, Willow quietly closed the door again and made her way to the stairs.
Stepping into the living room, she thought she heard the distance sirens of fire trucks and police cars somewhere off in the distance, but put that momentary distraction aside. If it turned out to be something for the Scooby Gang to look into, she'd deal with it then, but at that moment there was something else that demanded her attention.
Without further thought, she shut the door behind her and headed for the bookcase, pulling out one of the books she and Tara had brought into the Summers house with them the day they'd moved in to care for Dawn. The book was entitled 'History of Witchcraft', and was the same book Willow had once allowed Dawn to find to try to bring back her mother. She flicked through the pages until she came to the section with the header, 'Resurrection -- A Controversy Born.'. As she ran her finger down the page, her eyes darted across the text, repeating the process once she had turned to the next page.
Eventually a line of text caught her attention, and she began to read it quietly to herself.
"Sometimes, when the deceased has been killed by unnatural means, for example by mystical forces…" Willow's hopes rose, and she gripped the book closer, reading more intently, not noticing the slight increase in the pitch of her voice. "It is believed it may be possible to raise the person by making an appeal to Osiris, the Egyptian god of the Underworld. A spell to invoke Osiris for the purpose of resurrection is said to be in the Book of Amun Ra."
Willow looked up from the book, deep in thought. Giles has the Book of Amun Ra in his collection on the upper level. Willow frowned at that. Giles wasn't likely to be thrilled with the idea of using a resurrection spell, so how was she going to get the book without him noticing? If I could get Anya on board, she might be able to get it. Willow's frown deepened. She didn't want to get too many people involved in this until she was sure and, with Anya involved, Xander was likely to get suspicious at some point. At least now I know there's a chance… Hearing someone coming down the stairs, she closed the book and placed in back where it had been before. Then she walked over to the couch and sat down, trying to act casual.
Soon enough, the living room door opened, revealing a bleary-eyed Dawn Summers. "Hey Dawnie." Willow whispered, managing a welcoming smile. "What are you doing up?"
The younger girl simply shrugged, and replied, "Couldn't sleep."
Willow nodded, understanding. "Me neither," she managed to say with ease. It wasn't exactly a lie after all.
Dawn began to move towards the television, then stopped to ask, "Is it okay if I put the TV on?"
Willow smiled. "Yeah, just keep the volume down, okay?"
Dawn grabbed the remote from the sofa and turned the TV on. Nothing grabbed her interest was on the first channel, so she began skipping channels looking for something of interest. Willow was barely paying attention, thinking about whether to talk to Tara about her plan or not, but she caught a glimpse of a news report and a fire-ravaged scene on the screen, which together with the sirens in the distance, brought her back to reality.
"Dawn, could you give me the remote for a sec?" Willow stretched her hand outwards as she spoke. Dawn looked puzzled for a moment, but handed the remote over to the young witch. Remote in hand, Willow began skipping through the channels until she found the image she had seen before. The news reporter's voice was barely a whisper, so she turned the volume up a couple of notches and listened intently.
"…mystery arsonist dubbed the 'Sunnydale Torch' has struck again, setting a whole section of Sunnydale harbour ablaze. Police and Fire Department officials remain uncertain as to how the 'Torch' was able to set off a fire on such a large scale without causing injury to himself, or of what his possible motive is. However, they have vowed to stop at nothing until he is caught."
Willow remained transfixed by the scale of the destruction on the screen, while Dawn looked at her and asked, "You think it's something supernatural?"
Willow turned to Dawn, considering the question, then looked back at the inferno on the screen. Her reply was automatic, monotonous. "I hope not."
Because then we'll have to deal with it, she added mentally.
* * * * *
Spike crashed through the door of his crypt, falling to the floor as he landed inside. Smoke rose from his slowly cooking flesh, small chunks of which were missing from various parts of his body, having been vaporised by the flames that engulfed him earlier. Fortunately, he had only lost one major part of his body in this manner: his left leg, which had now been reduced to a dried up stump.
Now, with only one leg to work with, he had to pull himself along the floor and out of the sun's rays, which were, lucky for him, still somewhat weak. Then he crawled around the door and sat up with his back against it, pushing it shut with his weight.
Once the door was shut, he took a moment to try and rest, but the pain was too much, since his entire body was almost black with burns. He wasn't going to complain right now, though. As it was, he was lucky not to be ashtray fodder.
The sun had begun to rise just as he had made it back to the cemetery, not helping matters much. He'd thought he was going to bite the big one for sure. But he'd made it to shelter before the sun had reached its most deadly brilliance, and for that he was very grateful. However, he was still somewhat pissed off by the entire experience.
After jumping into the water at the harbour, Spike had spent what seemed like an eternity trying to swim ashore with his remaining leg. Once ashore, he'd pulled himself up onto his foot and hopped all the way back to the cemetery. Of course, he'd started hopping even more frantically when the sun had started to shine. In that condition, he was lucky no one had decided to pick a fight with him, as he would surely have lost. Obviously the Powers That Be didn't want him to die for some reason, but they must have thought it would be funny to torture him relentlessly before he made it to safety.
He took another moment to steel himself for the pain that would come with any movement, caused by the cracking of his brittle skin, then, with a stifled cry of agony, started to drag himself up onto his foot, using the door as a support. He did so slowly, to lessen the pain and reduce the risk of losing his balance. Once upright, he took a moment to think, in spite of the pain that threatened to overload his brain.
Well, this is no bloody good. He looked down at the stump that was left of his leg. He needed something to help him walk if he was going to make the trip to the Magic Box as soon as the sun went down. After a moment, he remembered that he had something somewhere in the crypt that might help him. Of course he didn't know exactly where he had put the thing. That, coupled with the limited movement his one-legged status allowed him, told him he had a long search ahead of him.
That's alright, he thought dryly as he got started hopping around and searching the crypt. There's plenty of time until sundown.
* * * * *
On the other side of Sunnydale, near the shore, the dragon flew alongside the rock face that made up this part of the coastline, looking for a place to shelter and rest for a while. Though the creature had no problems with being out during the daytime, it realised that this world was unlike the one it had come from. The humans here were resourceful and had much less primitive weaponry than in its own reality. But it seemed that there were no other dragons in this world either, therefore the humans were probably too inexperienced to deal with it. Nonetheless, it knew it was best to hunt only during the daytime, when the humans were most vulnerable…for now.
Eventually finding a large enough cavern in the rocks, out of the tides reach, the dragon flew inside and landed on the rocky floor, then moved deeper inside the cave and lay down on its belly. First it would get some sleep, and then it would wait patiently for night to fall once more. As soon as it did, it would be time go out on the hunt once again.
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Author's Notes:
First of all, for all the Spike fans out there, I'm sorry! Really! I like the guy, I really do, but I needed him out of the fight for this fic, so that's why I decided to put him through this torture. It's nothing personal against Spike.
As you can see I'm gonna try and show Willow and the others in the beginning stages of the plan to bring Buffy back, which I'm gonna try and use as a secondary storyline.
I'm going try and get some work started on Chapter Two soon, but with all the college projects mounting up and stuff it could take a while, so bear with me.
The formatting hasn't turned out quite the way I would have liked here on fanfiction.net, but hopefully, once I get everything set up to post the fic on my website, you'll be able to see it in the way I intended it to be seen.
Well, that's all for now folks and again, please R&R so that I know to continue the story.
Cya l8r!
P.S. It has come to my attention that at least one person who reviewed this fic, may believe that I am planning on resurrecting Buffy at some point in the course of the story. I would just like to make it clear to everyone that this fic is NOT an AU story.
It deals with events that may have happened between 'The Gift' and 'Bargaining Part One' and I do not intend to add anything that doesn't fit with the series' continuity. There will be a sub-plot showing Willow and the others starting to plan to resurrect Buffy, but Buffy will not actually be resurrected 'during' the fic.
I'm sorry if there has been any confusion about this.
As for my progress in writing the rest of the story, I am currently working on chapter 2 and expect to have it ready within the next week or two. Stay tuned, folks!