Title: RETURN
Author: Ivytree
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: Like I could create these guys.
All characters belong to Joss Whedon, UPN, Mutant Enemy, etc.
Feedback: Please!
Summary: A Spike-centric alternative ending (which you can bet will never happen) for Ep. 22 of this season, incorporating many (though not all) recent spoilers. The end of BtVS, and the beginning of The Spike Show.
NOT AT ALL SPOILERY
-------------------------------------------
RETURN
Part 25. Bright as Lightnings
"M'sieur Giles, shall we try our weapons?"
"We, ah, don't have buttons for our foils."
"In truth, I will undertake not to touch you, my friend," Etienne said.
"But I might pink you - "
Without the slightest intention of offending, Etienne then annoyed Giles very much. He smiled in pure amusement. "Oh, I do not think so," he said easily.
Five against eight - especially when two of the five were the Slayer and a vampire master-swordsman - were acceptable odds. Giles, Buffy, Etienne, Xander, and Clem would go on an expedition to 'neutralize' Rack and his minions tonight, before he grew even stronger. Since everyone would need to use a sword Etienne wanted to see what the others could do, so they pushed the furniture back in the living room for a brief practice session. True, the circumstances weren't ideal, but they wouldn't be later on, either. The others watched with interest from a safe distance.
Giles stretched his sword arm. "Well, perhaps not," he conceded; "and anyway, you are using a vampire's body. It wouldn't damage him much if I did pink you."
"Hey!" Buffy said irately. "There will be no wanton damage to Spike!"
"I only meant - "
"Do not worry, Buffy," Etienne intervened, charmingly mispronouncing her name. "I think M'sieur Giles will not damage M'sieur Spike at all."
"Very well," said Giles, growing quite nettled. Really, it wasn't as if he were an amateur. After all, he'd used the fellow's own books. "Shall we begin, then?"
Etienne said, "But certainly." They stood facing each other in the middle of the room and saluted with two fairly high-grade rapiers.
Surprisingly, Giles opened quickly with a feint to the right, which was met with an easy riposte, and a return attack starting rather low, which he was able to parry. But from then on, all his concentration was taken up with meeting an astonishing variety of feints and thrusts, some of them seeming to come very close to his person.
Jonathan looked frightened, and backed up even further. This was very noisy and scary, and as far as he could see, those pointy steel blades were just as likely to spin out of control. Anya stood breathlessly with her hands clasped before her; it had been decades - okay, even a couple of centuries - since she'd seen a good duel (in fact she'd caused quite a few herself), and she'd forgotten how thrilling it was to watch.
All Xander knew about swordplay was summarized in a quote from The Mask of Zorro: "The pointy end goes into the other man." Somehow, Giles and Etienne's fencing was more like a dance; each one seemed almost magically to know where the other's blade was going to go, and was prepared to meet it. He could almost hear the music, the rhythm accompanied by metallic clangs and slithers. It was dazzling and impossible. They weren't trading quips like Robin Hood and the Sheriff of Nottingham, but Etienne was certainly laughing.
Finally (after what seemed like a very long time to Giles) Etienne stepped back, dropping his sword point. "But this is truly excellent, my friend," he said enthusiastically. "Far too good for mere Kaa Lore demons!"
"Thank you," Giles wheezed. "I'm a bit out of practice." He noticed with resentment that his opponent was not even breathing hard - or at all.
Buffy actually jumped up and down. "Me next! Me next!" she cried. Etienne bowed slightly, and she assumed her position opposite him, eyes shining. She really did enjoy swordplay. They took each other's measure for a moment, both with serious expressions. This was worthy of respect. They touched swords in the middle, and then the bout began.
The two flashing swords were literally a glinting blur to their observers; the blades moved up, down, across, back, left and right with truly inhuman speed. Etienne obviously had the advantage of height and reach, but Buffy spun like a dervish, and what's more was an original tactician, attempting more than once to throw him off-guard with some unusual counter-move. They were both laughing when they stepped back on some signal invisible to the others. "Very, very good, Buffy!" he said. "You have such force! If you studied, you would be truly formidable."
"If I studied?" Buffy almost pouted. Actually, she thought she was pretty formidable right now. And she didn't like to study.
"If you learned to think ahead, you would be almost invincible," he said with calm authority. "You must not only know what your opponent will do of his own accord, but lead him to do what you want him to do. Then he is in your power, in effect, and you can kill him swiftly. Or slowly, if you wish," he added, with a rather disconcerting grin. Suddenly he looked like Spike.
"Well, that is an excellent lesson for another time, don't you think?" Giles interrupted, as Buffy opened her mouth to argue. "Right now, we need to prepare ourselves."
"But yes, certainly. M'sieur Giles, will you instruct M'sieur Clement?" He turned to Xander. "Come, M'sieur Harris, let us see how you hold a sword." Xander gulped, then moved resolutely forward to take his lesson in swordsmanship.
With some assistance from Giles, Jonathan was able to throw a protective ward around the house, which would hold for a relatively brief period of time - long enough for them to complete their mission, Giles hoped. Willow, Jonathan, and Anya stayed at the Summers house with Dawn.
Finally, the designated fighters piled into Buffy's Mom's SUV and drove off on their mission. Afterwards, Jonathan paced the living room nervously; he was committed now, but he didn't have to like it. They had pushed the furniture back into place, and Dawn was watching re-runs on TV, while Anya leafed unseeingly through a fashion magazine, making occasional derogatory comments.
Willow really didn't feel that she could face talking to Anya, and Dawn still didn't meet her eyes. But she didn't want to talk to Jonathan, either; if she was fated to be a nerd once more, at least she wasn't going to start by hanging out with an uber-nerd. She went back into the dining room and fired up the laptop again. Maybe she could hit the net and find out more about these demons.
She was absorbed in this when Jonathan worked up the nerve to seek her out nevertheless. After all, he'd known her since the third grade, or seen her in the hallways at school, anyway. They weren't exactly friends, but - well, they knew each other. He knew that he hadn't come off too well in the late unpleasantness with Warren, but Willow hadn't either.
Also, something had been worrying him. "So what's with Spike?" he said. "I thought he was a vampire. And, you know, evil. Why's he here?"
"Now he's sort of a super-vampire," Willow said unhelpfully, apparently engrossed in what she was doing. "And not so much with the evil anymore, either. I'm guessing he's here to help Buffy." She smiled a little uncertainly, reserve in her eyes that he couldn't understand. "That's what we're all here for, isn't it?"
She'd managed to find a good demon concordance site, and was doing a comprehensive search on Kaa Lore demons. He was just about to ask her about it, when all of a sudden she opened her eyes in dismay; Jonathan looked at the screen too, and gasped.
"Oops!" Willow said.
TBC
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
"'Allez, messieurs!' The slender, wickedly delicate blades clashed together, and after a momentary glissade were whirling, swift and bright as lightnings, and almost as impossible to follow with the eye."
Rafael Sabatini, Scaramouche
Author: Ivytree
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: Like I could create these guys.
All characters belong to Joss Whedon, UPN, Mutant Enemy, etc.
Feedback: Please!
Summary: A Spike-centric alternative ending (which you can bet will never happen) for Ep. 22 of this season, incorporating many (though not all) recent spoilers. The end of BtVS, and the beginning of The Spike Show.
NOT AT ALL SPOILERY
-------------------------------------------
RETURN
Part 25. Bright as Lightnings
"M'sieur Giles, shall we try our weapons?"
"We, ah, don't have buttons for our foils."
"In truth, I will undertake not to touch you, my friend," Etienne said.
"But I might pink you - "
Without the slightest intention of offending, Etienne then annoyed Giles very much. He smiled in pure amusement. "Oh, I do not think so," he said easily.
Five against eight - especially when two of the five were the Slayer and a vampire master-swordsman - were acceptable odds. Giles, Buffy, Etienne, Xander, and Clem would go on an expedition to 'neutralize' Rack and his minions tonight, before he grew even stronger. Since everyone would need to use a sword Etienne wanted to see what the others could do, so they pushed the furniture back in the living room for a brief practice session. True, the circumstances weren't ideal, but they wouldn't be later on, either. The others watched with interest from a safe distance.
Giles stretched his sword arm. "Well, perhaps not," he conceded; "and anyway, you are using a vampire's body. It wouldn't damage him much if I did pink you."
"Hey!" Buffy said irately. "There will be no wanton damage to Spike!"
"I only meant - "
"Do not worry, Buffy," Etienne intervened, charmingly mispronouncing her name. "I think M'sieur Giles will not damage M'sieur Spike at all."
"Very well," said Giles, growing quite nettled. Really, it wasn't as if he were an amateur. After all, he'd used the fellow's own books. "Shall we begin, then?"
Etienne said, "But certainly." They stood facing each other in the middle of the room and saluted with two fairly high-grade rapiers.
Surprisingly, Giles opened quickly with a feint to the right, which was met with an easy riposte, and a return attack starting rather low, which he was able to parry. But from then on, all his concentration was taken up with meeting an astonishing variety of feints and thrusts, some of them seeming to come very close to his person.
Jonathan looked frightened, and backed up even further. This was very noisy and scary, and as far as he could see, those pointy steel blades were just as likely to spin out of control. Anya stood breathlessly with her hands clasped before her; it had been decades - okay, even a couple of centuries - since she'd seen a good duel (in fact she'd caused quite a few herself), and she'd forgotten how thrilling it was to watch.
All Xander knew about swordplay was summarized in a quote from The Mask of Zorro: "The pointy end goes into the other man." Somehow, Giles and Etienne's fencing was more like a dance; each one seemed almost magically to know where the other's blade was going to go, and was prepared to meet it. He could almost hear the music, the rhythm accompanied by metallic clangs and slithers. It was dazzling and impossible. They weren't trading quips like Robin Hood and the Sheriff of Nottingham, but Etienne was certainly laughing.
Finally (after what seemed like a very long time to Giles) Etienne stepped back, dropping his sword point. "But this is truly excellent, my friend," he said enthusiastically. "Far too good for mere Kaa Lore demons!"
"Thank you," Giles wheezed. "I'm a bit out of practice." He noticed with resentment that his opponent was not even breathing hard - or at all.
Buffy actually jumped up and down. "Me next! Me next!" she cried. Etienne bowed slightly, and she assumed her position opposite him, eyes shining. She really did enjoy swordplay. They took each other's measure for a moment, both with serious expressions. This was worthy of respect. They touched swords in the middle, and then the bout began.
The two flashing swords were literally a glinting blur to their observers; the blades moved up, down, across, back, left and right with truly inhuman speed. Etienne obviously had the advantage of height and reach, but Buffy spun like a dervish, and what's more was an original tactician, attempting more than once to throw him off-guard with some unusual counter-move. They were both laughing when they stepped back on some signal invisible to the others. "Very, very good, Buffy!" he said. "You have such force! If you studied, you would be truly formidable."
"If I studied?" Buffy almost pouted. Actually, she thought she was pretty formidable right now. And she didn't like to study.
"If you learned to think ahead, you would be almost invincible," he said with calm authority. "You must not only know what your opponent will do of his own accord, but lead him to do what you want him to do. Then he is in your power, in effect, and you can kill him swiftly. Or slowly, if you wish," he added, with a rather disconcerting grin. Suddenly he looked like Spike.
"Well, that is an excellent lesson for another time, don't you think?" Giles interrupted, as Buffy opened her mouth to argue. "Right now, we need to prepare ourselves."
"But yes, certainly. M'sieur Giles, will you instruct M'sieur Clement?" He turned to Xander. "Come, M'sieur Harris, let us see how you hold a sword." Xander gulped, then moved resolutely forward to take his lesson in swordsmanship.
With some assistance from Giles, Jonathan was able to throw a protective ward around the house, which would hold for a relatively brief period of time - long enough for them to complete their mission, Giles hoped. Willow, Jonathan, and Anya stayed at the Summers house with Dawn.
Finally, the designated fighters piled into Buffy's Mom's SUV and drove off on their mission. Afterwards, Jonathan paced the living room nervously; he was committed now, but he didn't have to like it. They had pushed the furniture back into place, and Dawn was watching re-runs on TV, while Anya leafed unseeingly through a fashion magazine, making occasional derogatory comments.
Willow really didn't feel that she could face talking to Anya, and Dawn still didn't meet her eyes. But she didn't want to talk to Jonathan, either; if she was fated to be a nerd once more, at least she wasn't going to start by hanging out with an uber-nerd. She went back into the dining room and fired up the laptop again. Maybe she could hit the net and find out more about these demons.
She was absorbed in this when Jonathan worked up the nerve to seek her out nevertheless. After all, he'd known her since the third grade, or seen her in the hallways at school, anyway. They weren't exactly friends, but - well, they knew each other. He knew that he hadn't come off too well in the late unpleasantness with Warren, but Willow hadn't either.
Also, something had been worrying him. "So what's with Spike?" he said. "I thought he was a vampire. And, you know, evil. Why's he here?"
"Now he's sort of a super-vampire," Willow said unhelpfully, apparently engrossed in what she was doing. "And not so much with the evil anymore, either. I'm guessing he's here to help Buffy." She smiled a little uncertainly, reserve in her eyes that he couldn't understand. "That's what we're all here for, isn't it?"
She'd managed to find a good demon concordance site, and was doing a comprehensive search on Kaa Lore demons. He was just about to ask her about it, when all of a sudden she opened her eyes in dismay; Jonathan looked at the screen too, and gasped.
"Oops!" Willow said.
TBC
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
"'Allez, messieurs!' The slender, wickedly delicate blades clashed together, and after a momentary glissade were whirling, swift and bright as lightnings, and almost as impossible to follow with the eye."
Rafael Sabatini, Scaramouche