Author: Shannon (mighty_minnie_mouse@hotmail.com)
Title: I Ran.
Rating: Maybe R, for violence.
Summary: Little Buffy/Willow ficlet, post-Chose. No real spoilers for it though, as I'm kind of making it up.
Notes: Major character death. Not a fluffy fic. Willow's POV.

Nobody made it. I mean, I knew it would be disastrous... But this... I... I wasn't prepared. I wasn't prepared to lose so many people I love.

I'm in L.A. I'm with Angel, and Cordy... Fred, Wesley, Connor and Gunn. They've been great, but there's still this gaping hole in my chest that feels like it's going to turn me inside out whenever I breathe.

All the slayers in training died within seconds. The look on Kennedy's face, for the split second that she still had one, was completely and utterly horrific when one of the Bringers... They... They sliced right down the middle of her skull with one of those old ceremonial daggers they use. It was so terrifying; and not only the fact that my girlfriend had been murdered in front of me. I know we were never serious – It wasn't love, it was something else – But I cared. I was so terrified... I'd never ran so hard, and so fast. I felt so weak.

Xander and Anya's deaths had been mild – compared to the others. They died together, which I supposed would've pleased them, in a strangely morbid way. They were standing back-to-back, fighting off vampires, when one of them charged and impaled them both on a sword, as if they were being served for dinner on a stick.

I never thought I'd feel for Spike, as much as I did at the moment of his second death. The other vamps must have known that he was one too, because they didn't go for swords – No, they went for limbs. They disarmed him of all weapons, and cornered him... They grabbed his arms, his legs, any limb they could and ripped them away from him, leaving his torso of shredded flesh stranded in a puddle of blood, before bringing their feet down on his throat, over and over until the weakened vampire exploded into dust from decapitation.

Buffy. To me, Buffy's death was in slow motion. She was running, her blonde her trailing behind her. I was behind her, and I could see the Bringer in front of her – But I knew she couldn't. She was running blindly from the one behind her. In my entire life, I had never, ever seen Buffy run. Not with the terrified look she had on her face. I called out to her; I screamed to her to watch where she was going, and she turned around – She turned around to listen to me.

And she smiled. She smiled at me, and said, "I love you."

I allowed a smile to begin to form on my face, but before it could reach my cheeks, the beatutiful girl was implaed by both Bringers rushing towards her. A dagger in her back, and one through her heart. The heart that I wanted to claim as my own. Her eyes shifted towards me, and I heard her try to make out my name... But the sound never left her lips, before she collapsed into a heap on the cold, stone floor. Her eyes staring blankly out.

She wasn't coming back, and I knew what I had to do.

I ran.

And I never came back.