Disclaimer: Not mine. It all belongs to the God Almighty, Joss Whedon. The
other TV shows mentioned aren't mine either.
Timeline: Early Season 6. After Tabula Rasa, before Smashed.
Thanks again everyone for the reviews! I really appreciate every one! I've got a couple of comments for some people:
Jan - I didn't actually know where it was going at all before I posted it, but soon after I did I figured out all that was going to happen, and it was glaringly obvious which couple it needed to be. I'm a shipper of both pairings, and I wasn't teasing my readers. I was asking for their opinion. I didn't need their opinions in the end, but I wasn't trying to tease anyone, and I'm really sorry if I upset anyone by doing it.
White Wolf 3 - Oops! She would have, wouldn't she? *blushes* See, that's why I need a beta reader, to stop me from doing stuff like that. Anyone???
Ello - Only 14 days till the new season starts and counting. You can bet the minute I see them they'll be appearing on here in some way. especially if they aren't as Spuffy as they should be (
scapergirl - Glad you thought it was worth the wait. You're more patient than I would've been!
Thanks also to sita, Green-Eyed-Goddess, Spuffygirl, A Reviewer, Teri, JSlayerUK, Rachel, raine77, Star, arba, Cara, Sweatermonkey, Shelby, fastpilot, Aeryn, Graffiti, D@rk_Angel, no_1_in_particular, Michelle, NevermindDaria, FanOfFaith, ~fangfacey~, LiVe ThE nIgHtMaRe, and Ecolea. *******
"Here it is!" Willow grinned as she looked up from the book she was reading, triumph on her face. The gang were in the Magic Box, looking through the books Angel had given them. They had been looking since Buffy had got back, but the books hadn't been as helpful as Angel had said they would be.
"Oh, thank God!" Xander shut his book with a bang. "I know Angel was trying to help, but couldn't he have given us a page number or something?"
Buffy wandered over to the table where the others sat. "So, Will, what does it say?"
"One of the more deadly of the assassin demons is the Mohra demon. The Mohra demon hunts down the warriors of the Powers that Be, intent on lessening their number for The End of Days. They need vast quantities of salt to live, yet are extremely hard to kill, as their blood has regenerative powers, and any serious wounds will only make them stronger. It keeps regenerating its life until the dark future it envisions for the world is upon us. The only way to slay the beast is to bring darkness to the thousand eyes." Willow looked up from the book. "What does that mean?"
"Not a clue." Buffy's face was creased in confusion. "What about this End of Days thingy? What does it say about that?"
"Nothing. Just that that's what this demon's waiting for."
"Well, if this demon's waiting for it, it must be important, right? Surely it says something about it. I mean, Angel said it was all in there, so."
"Well, I'll look, but it might take a while. It's a pretty thick book."
"Oh, okay. Thanks, Will." Buffy smiled at her friend, then stood up and wandered back over to the training room.
"Hey, wait a minute Buffy! I thought you and Spike looked for stuff about that demon on the internet last night?"
"Yeah," Buffy said. "Yeah, we did."
"Well, did you find anything? Maybe there's something about the End of Days on there."
"The thing is, I did find something, but. it wasn't what I thought I'd find."
"What was it, Buff?" Xander looked worriedly over at Buffy. "Was it something bad?"
"No! No, it was just weird." She walked back over to the table, and sank back down into the chair. "I went onto this website, and it had. it was about us. It had pictures of us, of me and Angel, and it had stories written about us, and like. descriptions of stuff that had happened to us. It was really weird."
"It must have been one of those TV dimension thingies."
Everyone looked over at Anya. "What?"
"Well, you know, everything on TV is real, but in another dimension. It's like the TV is a window into these dimensions, and people watch them as cheap entertainment."
"What, so *everything* on TV is real?" Xander stared at his girlfriend, disbelief on his face. "Even the cartoons?"
"Yes, but in a different dimension. Like The Rugrats is in the world of perpetual youth, and The Simpsons is in this dimension where everyone's yellow. And Popstars is in that world where no-one can sing."
"But that doesn't make sense," Willow said, obviously confused. "A lot of shows take place in places here. In this dimension."
"Well, a lot of them come from the world without shrimp. Haven't you ever wondered why no-one EVER eats shrimp on TV? Either that or they're from this really weird dimension that's exactly like ours, except there's no demons or magic or anything."
"Woah, wouldn't we all love to live there!" Buffy muttered under her breath, before saying, "So, some people in some dimension watch *us*? As *entertainment*?"
"What?!" Xander looked about in a panic. "So there are people watching us RIGHT NOW!"
"Don't be silly, Xander. They don't watch us twenty four - seven. That would get boring, and ratings would drop. It's like a crystal ball. They see what's going to happen to us in the future. If anyone was watching this, it would've been last year, or even earlier."
"So a bunch of strangers know what's going to happen to me months before I do?"
"Well, yeah."
*So that explains it,* Buffy thought. *Maybe that thing with Angel hasn't happened yet. Maybe he's going to be human in a year or two, and it was only there because they're ahead of us. It's a good thing I didn't mention it, then.*
"But this still doesn't explain why I found a website about this, this. TV show on Will's computer." Buffy looked round at the group, trying to take it all in. "And another thing. when I looked it up on Cordy's computer, I couldn't find it. It wasn't there."
"Well, the browser you used was new," Willow said, thoughtfully, "and it said on the box it was really popular, "Used by millions of people world- wide", but I'd never heard of it before. Maybe. maybe it's a browser from whatever dimension watches us on TV, and it connects to their internet. That's why you found all these sites you couldn't find on a different machine."
"Yeah, that's probably it."
"Do you think I should take it back?" Willow asked, concerned.
"No! I think maybe it'll be fun to see just what people think of our lives, you know?"
"You shouldn't mess with that," Anya said, in a serious tone Buffy had never heard her use before. "It's dangerous. If you start messing with other dimensions, God knows what could happen."
"I'm not gonna mess," Buffy said. "I'm just gonna. look."
**********
Buffy sat down at the computer, with Spike, once again, at her side. Willow was busy researching, and she had a feeling that the others would try to stop her from doing this. Not that there was any reason for them to stop her anyway. It wasn't as if she was going to change anything, she was just going to have a look.
"So, what are we looking for today, luv?" Spike asked, as she logged in.
"More stuff like we found yesterday. I want to know all about this, this TV show thing." She had already explained to him all that had been said at the Magic Box. She carefully clicked in the search bar, and then asked, "What should I search for?"
"Well, if you think this show is about us, why don't you try your name?"
"Okay." Buffy quickly typed in "Buffy Summers" and clicked search. A few seconds later a list of sites appeared, and Buffy was overwhelmed by just how many there were.
"123,293 matches?" she asked, incredulously.
"Guess you're pretty well known in this dimension, pet."
"Guess I am," she said to herself, before scanning the list. "How about this one - The Buffy Summers Fan Club."
She clicked on the link, and was taken to a screen with a huge picture of her in the centre, surrounded by yet more links.
"What do you think we should go on?" Buffy asked, as she moved the mouse distractedly round the screen. "Message Boards? Episode Guides? Quizzes?"
"How about a quiz, luv? If it's about your life, you should be able to get at least a few right."
Buffy clicked on the link that said quizzes, and then studied the choices she was given.
"Okay then, we can have a quiz about any one of the 6 seasons, or one about one of us. I'll try. one about me. That should be nice and easy, right?"
As the first question appeared in front of her, Buffy gave a smug little grin. "Well, this is hard! "What is the name of Buffy's pet pig? A) Mr Gordy B) Mr Gordo C) Mr Pinky or D) Pork Chops."" She clicked on B, and laughed in triumph as she got it right. Then her grin faded as she saw the next question. ""When Buffy first met Cordelia, what was the lesson they were in about?" How the hell is ANYONE supposed to know that?!"
**********
"Wrong again, Slayer" Spike said with a grin as Buffy got her tenth and final question wrong.
Buffy stared at her score angrily. "3 out of 10 - a fair weather fan?! How could I have only got 3 OUT OF 10?! The quiz was about ME!"
"Guess you don't know yourself as well as you thought, luv."
"Shut up, Spike." Buffy clicked back onto the main page. "That wasn't fair. It was impossible. No-one could have got a high score with questions that hard."
"So, where to next?"
"How about this one?" Buffy moved the mouse to hover over a link labelled OMWF. "What do you think that means?"
"Dunno, luv. Why don't we have a look?"
Buffy clicked it, and then studied her new options. She could choose to view The Plot, The Script, The Lyrics, or Media Files.
"Which one?"
"Well, how about the plot? Might be able to see what it's about."
Buffy clicked on the link, and then read aloud what she saw. "While the Scoobies go about their daily lives, a new demon is in town which makes everyone start singing and dancing. As people start letting out their true feelings, Dawn is kidnapped by the demon, who plans to take her to hell and make her his bride." Buffy looked excitedly at Spike. "This is what happened last week! This is an episode about all the singing and dancing and stuff that happened last week! Oh my God, I sang on TV! Do you think I sounded okay?"
"Well, maybe there's some clips or something. Then you could hear for yourself."
"Yeah." Buffy searched around the site until she found some. "Here. A mixture of clips from some of the best songs. Lets listen to this." She downloaded the file, adjusted the speakers, and then pressed play.
She flinched as her voice came booming out of the speakers, singing about slaying.
"Oh my God, I sound awful! How could they play that on TV? I probably broke all the windows of the people who were watching!"
"You don't sound awful."
"Yes I do! It's screechy and tuneless and awful!"
"Buffy," Spike said, taking her hands in his. "It's beautiful."
"Really?" Buffy asked, trying to ignore the shivers that were flying up and down her arm.
"Really," Spike said. He sounded so serious Buffy didn't want to argue. She smiled weakly at him, and reached to turn off the music.
"So, what are we going to do now, luv?" Spike asked.
Buffy clicked the back button until she got back to the main page, then scanned the links again. "Ooh, buy the box sets!"
"Buffy." Spike said, warningly. Buffy ignored him and clicked the link.
"Look, they're only $20 each, and seasons 5 and 6 are buy one get one free!"
"Buffy."
"There are two to a season, so that'll only cost me $40 for both."
"Buffy!"
"What?"
"You can't buy them!"
"Why not?"
"Well, it's another dimension for one thing. How are they going to get here?"
"Well, this browser got here, didn't it? So maybe these'll get here as well." Buffy noticed Spike exasperated expression, and added, "I really want to know what happens in them."
"Buffy," Spike said slowly, as though talking to a very small child, "this is about your life. I think you already know what happens."
"Yeah, but I want to see how people in this other dimension see us." And with that, Buffy filled out the order form, and sent it off.
"There! Now we'll be able to watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer in the privacy of our own home in 3 to 5 working days, providing cross dimension delivery doesn't take longer. Do you think the postage will be more, cos of the whole different dimension thing?"
Spike just stared at her.
"Look, I'm just curious. I know what Anya said about messing with stuff like this, but I'm not going to do anything. I'm just going to watch a few episodes of my life, all of which have happened to me, so it's not like I'm going to see what's going to happen in the future or anything."
"Fine."
"And don't tell anyone about this! If they find out I'm gonna watch some of this show, they'll have a freak out or something, so DON'T tell them!"
"Okay, Slayer. My lips are sealed."
"Good. Well, I'd better go. I've gotta patrol, look for that Mohra demon."
"Do you want me to come with?"
"Yeah, that'd be nice."
Buffy quickly logged off the computer, grabbed her coat, and headed off into the night, Spike at her heel. She couldn't wait until the videos came. Then the fun would begin.
A/N - Please R/R. If any of this is too English, please tell me! I'm not sure if you have Popstars in America, but if you don't you probably have something similar. It's one of those shows where they audition people to be in a pop group, none of which can sing, and the viewers vote for who should be in a band.
Thanks for everyone's suggestions about what they should come across on the net. Some of them are just too good to not use. Watch this space! Any other suggestions would be really appreciated as well! Thanks!
Timeline: Early Season 6. After Tabula Rasa, before Smashed.
Thanks again everyone for the reviews! I really appreciate every one! I've got a couple of comments for some people:
Jan - I didn't actually know where it was going at all before I posted it, but soon after I did I figured out all that was going to happen, and it was glaringly obvious which couple it needed to be. I'm a shipper of both pairings, and I wasn't teasing my readers. I was asking for their opinion. I didn't need their opinions in the end, but I wasn't trying to tease anyone, and I'm really sorry if I upset anyone by doing it.
White Wolf 3 - Oops! She would have, wouldn't she? *blushes* See, that's why I need a beta reader, to stop me from doing stuff like that. Anyone???
Ello - Only 14 days till the new season starts and counting. You can bet the minute I see them they'll be appearing on here in some way. especially if they aren't as Spuffy as they should be (
scapergirl - Glad you thought it was worth the wait. You're more patient than I would've been!
Thanks also to sita, Green-Eyed-Goddess, Spuffygirl, A Reviewer, Teri, JSlayerUK, Rachel, raine77, Star, arba, Cara, Sweatermonkey, Shelby, fastpilot, Aeryn, Graffiti, D@rk_Angel, no_1_in_particular, Michelle, NevermindDaria, FanOfFaith, ~fangfacey~, LiVe ThE nIgHtMaRe, and Ecolea. *******
"Here it is!" Willow grinned as she looked up from the book she was reading, triumph on her face. The gang were in the Magic Box, looking through the books Angel had given them. They had been looking since Buffy had got back, but the books hadn't been as helpful as Angel had said they would be.
"Oh, thank God!" Xander shut his book with a bang. "I know Angel was trying to help, but couldn't he have given us a page number or something?"
Buffy wandered over to the table where the others sat. "So, Will, what does it say?"
"One of the more deadly of the assassin demons is the Mohra demon. The Mohra demon hunts down the warriors of the Powers that Be, intent on lessening their number for The End of Days. They need vast quantities of salt to live, yet are extremely hard to kill, as their blood has regenerative powers, and any serious wounds will only make them stronger. It keeps regenerating its life until the dark future it envisions for the world is upon us. The only way to slay the beast is to bring darkness to the thousand eyes." Willow looked up from the book. "What does that mean?"
"Not a clue." Buffy's face was creased in confusion. "What about this End of Days thingy? What does it say about that?"
"Nothing. Just that that's what this demon's waiting for."
"Well, if this demon's waiting for it, it must be important, right? Surely it says something about it. I mean, Angel said it was all in there, so."
"Well, I'll look, but it might take a while. It's a pretty thick book."
"Oh, okay. Thanks, Will." Buffy smiled at her friend, then stood up and wandered back over to the training room.
"Hey, wait a minute Buffy! I thought you and Spike looked for stuff about that demon on the internet last night?"
"Yeah," Buffy said. "Yeah, we did."
"Well, did you find anything? Maybe there's something about the End of Days on there."
"The thing is, I did find something, but. it wasn't what I thought I'd find."
"What was it, Buff?" Xander looked worriedly over at Buffy. "Was it something bad?"
"No! No, it was just weird." She walked back over to the table, and sank back down into the chair. "I went onto this website, and it had. it was about us. It had pictures of us, of me and Angel, and it had stories written about us, and like. descriptions of stuff that had happened to us. It was really weird."
"It must have been one of those TV dimension thingies."
Everyone looked over at Anya. "What?"
"Well, you know, everything on TV is real, but in another dimension. It's like the TV is a window into these dimensions, and people watch them as cheap entertainment."
"What, so *everything* on TV is real?" Xander stared at his girlfriend, disbelief on his face. "Even the cartoons?"
"Yes, but in a different dimension. Like The Rugrats is in the world of perpetual youth, and The Simpsons is in this dimension where everyone's yellow. And Popstars is in that world where no-one can sing."
"But that doesn't make sense," Willow said, obviously confused. "A lot of shows take place in places here. In this dimension."
"Well, a lot of them come from the world without shrimp. Haven't you ever wondered why no-one EVER eats shrimp on TV? Either that or they're from this really weird dimension that's exactly like ours, except there's no demons or magic or anything."
"Woah, wouldn't we all love to live there!" Buffy muttered under her breath, before saying, "So, some people in some dimension watch *us*? As *entertainment*?"
"What?!" Xander looked about in a panic. "So there are people watching us RIGHT NOW!"
"Don't be silly, Xander. They don't watch us twenty four - seven. That would get boring, and ratings would drop. It's like a crystal ball. They see what's going to happen to us in the future. If anyone was watching this, it would've been last year, or even earlier."
"So a bunch of strangers know what's going to happen to me months before I do?"
"Well, yeah."
*So that explains it,* Buffy thought. *Maybe that thing with Angel hasn't happened yet. Maybe he's going to be human in a year or two, and it was only there because they're ahead of us. It's a good thing I didn't mention it, then.*
"But this still doesn't explain why I found a website about this, this. TV show on Will's computer." Buffy looked round at the group, trying to take it all in. "And another thing. when I looked it up on Cordy's computer, I couldn't find it. It wasn't there."
"Well, the browser you used was new," Willow said, thoughtfully, "and it said on the box it was really popular, "Used by millions of people world- wide", but I'd never heard of it before. Maybe. maybe it's a browser from whatever dimension watches us on TV, and it connects to their internet. That's why you found all these sites you couldn't find on a different machine."
"Yeah, that's probably it."
"Do you think I should take it back?" Willow asked, concerned.
"No! I think maybe it'll be fun to see just what people think of our lives, you know?"
"You shouldn't mess with that," Anya said, in a serious tone Buffy had never heard her use before. "It's dangerous. If you start messing with other dimensions, God knows what could happen."
"I'm not gonna mess," Buffy said. "I'm just gonna. look."
**********
Buffy sat down at the computer, with Spike, once again, at her side. Willow was busy researching, and she had a feeling that the others would try to stop her from doing this. Not that there was any reason for them to stop her anyway. It wasn't as if she was going to change anything, she was just going to have a look.
"So, what are we looking for today, luv?" Spike asked, as she logged in.
"More stuff like we found yesterday. I want to know all about this, this TV show thing." She had already explained to him all that had been said at the Magic Box. She carefully clicked in the search bar, and then asked, "What should I search for?"
"Well, if you think this show is about us, why don't you try your name?"
"Okay." Buffy quickly typed in "Buffy Summers" and clicked search. A few seconds later a list of sites appeared, and Buffy was overwhelmed by just how many there were.
"123,293 matches?" she asked, incredulously.
"Guess you're pretty well known in this dimension, pet."
"Guess I am," she said to herself, before scanning the list. "How about this one - The Buffy Summers Fan Club."
She clicked on the link, and was taken to a screen with a huge picture of her in the centre, surrounded by yet more links.
"What do you think we should go on?" Buffy asked, as she moved the mouse distractedly round the screen. "Message Boards? Episode Guides? Quizzes?"
"How about a quiz, luv? If it's about your life, you should be able to get at least a few right."
Buffy clicked on the link that said quizzes, and then studied the choices she was given.
"Okay then, we can have a quiz about any one of the 6 seasons, or one about one of us. I'll try. one about me. That should be nice and easy, right?"
As the first question appeared in front of her, Buffy gave a smug little grin. "Well, this is hard! "What is the name of Buffy's pet pig? A) Mr Gordy B) Mr Gordo C) Mr Pinky or D) Pork Chops."" She clicked on B, and laughed in triumph as she got it right. Then her grin faded as she saw the next question. ""When Buffy first met Cordelia, what was the lesson they were in about?" How the hell is ANYONE supposed to know that?!"
**********
"Wrong again, Slayer" Spike said with a grin as Buffy got her tenth and final question wrong.
Buffy stared at her score angrily. "3 out of 10 - a fair weather fan?! How could I have only got 3 OUT OF 10?! The quiz was about ME!"
"Guess you don't know yourself as well as you thought, luv."
"Shut up, Spike." Buffy clicked back onto the main page. "That wasn't fair. It was impossible. No-one could have got a high score with questions that hard."
"So, where to next?"
"How about this one?" Buffy moved the mouse to hover over a link labelled OMWF. "What do you think that means?"
"Dunno, luv. Why don't we have a look?"
Buffy clicked it, and then studied her new options. She could choose to view The Plot, The Script, The Lyrics, or Media Files.
"Which one?"
"Well, how about the plot? Might be able to see what it's about."
Buffy clicked on the link, and then read aloud what she saw. "While the Scoobies go about their daily lives, a new demon is in town which makes everyone start singing and dancing. As people start letting out their true feelings, Dawn is kidnapped by the demon, who plans to take her to hell and make her his bride." Buffy looked excitedly at Spike. "This is what happened last week! This is an episode about all the singing and dancing and stuff that happened last week! Oh my God, I sang on TV! Do you think I sounded okay?"
"Well, maybe there's some clips or something. Then you could hear for yourself."
"Yeah." Buffy searched around the site until she found some. "Here. A mixture of clips from some of the best songs. Lets listen to this." She downloaded the file, adjusted the speakers, and then pressed play.
She flinched as her voice came booming out of the speakers, singing about slaying.
"Oh my God, I sound awful! How could they play that on TV? I probably broke all the windows of the people who were watching!"
"You don't sound awful."
"Yes I do! It's screechy and tuneless and awful!"
"Buffy," Spike said, taking her hands in his. "It's beautiful."
"Really?" Buffy asked, trying to ignore the shivers that were flying up and down her arm.
"Really," Spike said. He sounded so serious Buffy didn't want to argue. She smiled weakly at him, and reached to turn off the music.
"So, what are we going to do now, luv?" Spike asked.
Buffy clicked the back button until she got back to the main page, then scanned the links again. "Ooh, buy the box sets!"
"Buffy." Spike said, warningly. Buffy ignored him and clicked the link.
"Look, they're only $20 each, and seasons 5 and 6 are buy one get one free!"
"Buffy."
"There are two to a season, so that'll only cost me $40 for both."
"Buffy!"
"What?"
"You can't buy them!"
"Why not?"
"Well, it's another dimension for one thing. How are they going to get here?"
"Well, this browser got here, didn't it? So maybe these'll get here as well." Buffy noticed Spike exasperated expression, and added, "I really want to know what happens in them."
"Buffy," Spike said slowly, as though talking to a very small child, "this is about your life. I think you already know what happens."
"Yeah, but I want to see how people in this other dimension see us." And with that, Buffy filled out the order form, and sent it off.
"There! Now we'll be able to watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer in the privacy of our own home in 3 to 5 working days, providing cross dimension delivery doesn't take longer. Do you think the postage will be more, cos of the whole different dimension thing?"
Spike just stared at her.
"Look, I'm just curious. I know what Anya said about messing with stuff like this, but I'm not going to do anything. I'm just going to watch a few episodes of my life, all of which have happened to me, so it's not like I'm going to see what's going to happen in the future or anything."
"Fine."
"And don't tell anyone about this! If they find out I'm gonna watch some of this show, they'll have a freak out or something, so DON'T tell them!"
"Okay, Slayer. My lips are sealed."
"Good. Well, I'd better go. I've gotta patrol, look for that Mohra demon."
"Do you want me to come with?"
"Yeah, that'd be nice."
Buffy quickly logged off the computer, grabbed her coat, and headed off into the night, Spike at her heel. She couldn't wait until the videos came. Then the fun would begin.
A/N - Please R/R. If any of this is too English, please tell me! I'm not sure if you have Popstars in America, but if you don't you probably have something similar. It's one of those shows where they audition people to be in a pop group, none of which can sing, and the viewers vote for who should be in a band.
Thanks for everyone's suggestions about what they should come across on the net. Some of them are just too good to not use. Watch this space! Any other suggestions would be really appreciated as well! Thanks!
