For Disclaimer et al, please see Chapter 1
The rumours started before the first bell had even rung. It was a gang hit - a gang on PCP. Or maybe it was suicide, or drug-induced self-mutilation gone awry. It was rabid dogs, mutated chipmunks, and a travelling band of disgruntled circus performers.
But none of the rumours came close to the truth surrounding Shawn's death. So the students of Sunnydale High whispered amongst each other, stared at the uniformed cops who stood disinterestedly by, and crossed to the far side of the hallway as they passed the crimson stain on the floor and the yellow police tape illuminating it.
Dawn waited around the corner for Jade, shooting apprehensive looks over her shoulder at the carnage of the night before. The night before. It was hard for her to believe that 12 hours ago she was blissfully unaware of so many things. Like how it felt to kill someone. And how blood has a way of sticking to your skin long after its washed away.
Principal Wood had delegated Buffy to arrange an emergency assembly to 'help the student body deal with the murder of their classmate'. So, Dawn had been ditched just inside the school doors, and now she was waiting for what seemed to be her only friend in the entire world.
Jade passed a cursory glance over the blood and gathering crowd before pushing through it all, heedless of the stares she attracted. When she finally emerged on the other side of the hall, she spotted Dawn immediately, who greeted her with a relieved smile.
"Thought you'd never get here," Dawn whispered as she fell into step with the other girl. Jade glared back at the rubbernecks while dramatically readjusting her cloth bag over her shoulder.
She replied with a rakish grin, "Tough crowd."
------
"…let's bow our heads in remembrance."
Watching the entire population of Sunnydale High mimic the principal caused Jade to roll her eyes. They were performing a mock prayer, calling it something else to sanctify it in a taboo-minded world, and none of these idiots had any idea why.
I remember how he chewed the yellow enamel off his pencil. I remember how he called me a guard dog. I remember Dawn telling me she used to crush on him. I remember the dead look in his eyes when he slumped through the doorway.
Unconsciously, Jade had begun to pull at the loose strings of her long-sleeved turtleneck (black, of course), fraying them even worse than they had been to begin with. They slid tightly over her hands, stopping just before the fingertips, and she'd worn holes in them to stick her thumbs through.
A girl a few rows ahead noticed that Jade wasn't 'remembering' Shawn. Probably one of his little girlfriends. She none too subtly gave the bitch the finger.
Principal Wood called their attention, and at the corner of her eye, Jade saw something move. By the time she looked, it was already gone, and though everyone's eyes faced forward, not on her or the mystery speck, she was sure that something had been there and had been watching and was still watching from somewhere past the rows and rows of heads.
"Buffy, I've got a meeting with Shawn's parents now. Do you think you could leave your finished paperwork on my desk? I'll swing by and pick it up on my way home."
She nodded in acquiescence as Robin shrugged his jacket on and left the building. Buffy was already planning to search his office, and hopefully find a clue to the 'shovel incident', when she noticed the ginormous stack of papers in her Inbox. With a whimper, she called home and told them she'd be late for dinner.
------
"I'm sorry Dawn, but I just can't leave right now. You'll have to walk home."
"What?" Dawn whined. "But, demons! A-and The First!"
Buffy rolled her eyes. "You can handle yourself in a fight - I saw you do it. And I know you can scream with the best of them. You'll be fine."
"This coming from a girl who's died twice?" Dawn retorted sarcastically. "Fine, send your loving, baby sister into the mouth of Hell - see if I care!" And with a harrumph she was sweeping majestically out the door. Her sister had become so much like her it was unnerving. Buffy smiled proudly.
------
"Wanna come over?"
A chill wind had picked up throughout the day, and Jade wrapped her arms tight beneath her breasts. "Sure that'll be okay with Buffy?"
Dawn shrugged. "Why not? Her friends are over all the time." Jade gave her a wry smile.
"Yeah, but I think I freak the others out."
Wiping back her errant hair, Dawn chanced a glance at her friend's disturbed expression. It would probably never be a good time to ask about her troubled past, so since they were kind of on the topic…
"So, last night, with the meeting. It was all closed doors, but," she gave Jade a lopsided smile, "maybe you want to talk about it?"
Jade didn't answer, and as they continued walking in silence, Dawn was afraid that she had overstepped the boundary of their brand new trust. Her companion's eyes were trained on the sky, her posture closed and defensive. Raven black hair flew into Jade's face, and with a sharp toss of her head, was banished away.
"I'm sorry. If it's hard for you to talk about -"
"My grandmother knew things, saw things, that nobody else was aware of. The day she died, she told me it would be a momentous day." She bowed her head slightly, as if in prayer. "Though who it was most momentous for, I'm still not sure."
Jade reached under her high collar and pulled out the cross she had used to fend off the vampire the night before. "This was Grandmama's. She gave it to me when I had my first impression. Once I inherited the Sight, she knew I was ready to hear the prophecy. She had Seen me fighting vampires - she knew I would be the one to fulfill the family legacy."
"Family legacy?"
"A curse, really." Jade fingered the small jewels, topaz and ruby and others she couldn't name, and scraped the palm of her hand across the thorns of raised silver. "The power of Foresight flows in our veins…centuries ago my great-ancestors saw the battle between the First and the Slayer. They saw our family there. They then made the prophecy so that each generation would have a purpose, a legacy, and would keep the Sight alive."
She dropped the cross, letting it settle against her chest. "I'm here to meet my destiny. I've tried running, I've tried hiding; nothing works. By moving here I thought I was escaping my prophesied death, but I ended up travelling straight towards it."
Her face tilted up to the sky where large drops of rain were beginning to fall from obese clouds.
"Tomorrow, tomorrow
Infinite we See
The End.
Upon a bed of
Unlocked doors
A shallow grave.
When the Warrior rises
The Prophet shall come,
Our child,
Our future,
Holding the hand
Of the unwinged Angel.
Unsung heroes, demonic
Soul earned, another
Cast by spell.
The Son and the Father,
Opposite,
Fight for their love,
Of the Body
And the Key.
Spun in a web
Of tarnished gold,
Together they shall
Lead the Light
Against the Dark
And the source
Of all Evil.
We See the End,
Of Us, of All,
Of tomorrow
And the day after.
We See the fall
Of the Prophet
And the rise of
The Dark.
We See to the End,
And in the end,
A Beginning."
Silence once again filled the spaces in-between. Jade was melancholy with both grief and fear, her arms tight around herself to fend off the chill of the rain and the ice in her heart. Dawn was turning the words over and over in her mind, her skill with languages tugging at it and breaking it down.
"It doesn't say you die," Dawn offered. Jade glanced sidelong at her from beneath a curtain of hair. "It says the Prophet falls, but…that could mean anything. It could be literal, or maybe you lose the Sight, or -"
"It's okay, Dawn. Really." She offered her friend a weak smile. "Zeke and I have been through this. He refuses to accept that I might very well die before my eighteenth birthday. And as much as I'd like to be not dead, it's been Seen. A long, long time ago." Jade shrugged.
"Death doesn't scare me. It's the transition that frightens me most. If only I knew the time and place…at least then I could prepare for it. Say my goodbyes." She paused. "I guess that's why I'm such a problem child - I'm living my life the way I want to because I know I don't have much time."
"Stop saying that!" Dawn hissed. The pain and fear in her eyes was not only for Jade, she could see that. Death was something that the youngest Summers has been too close to for too long.
"Okay," Jade agreed, "let's just not talk about it."
------
When Connor stepped into the Hyperion's lobby, Fred rushed over to him and pulled him aside.
"Cordelia's still acting really weird. She won't go shopping, she won't talk about shoes, or - or even how broody Angel is! I think there's something seriously, seriously wrong. We need to intervene!"
"Yes," Lorne agreed, joining their circle. "She needs an intervention. In a bad, bad way. I mean, look at her clothes!" They turned and viewed Cordelia's outfit - fringed black toga-like dress, a blood red choker, and killer heels that she'd bought especially for the ballet. "Either she's decided to try out for What Not to Wear, or she's even more traumatized than we thought."
"I'll talk to her," Connor offered, moving towards the girl in question. But Fred grabbed his arm.
"Talking hasn't done any good so far, but…well, what Lorne and I were thinking was, I mean, if you want to, because you don't have to if you don't want to -"
"What our pretty little Texan here is trying to say is, we think it might help Cordelia if you spent some quality time with her. We all know how much she loves you, and with Angelcakes all locked up in his office, well…you're the next closest person to her."
Connor glanced back at Cordelia, who caught his eye. She gave him a warm smile, and something inside his cold heart melted slightly at her affection.
"Yeah, okay. I'll do it."
Not!Cordelia could hear every word the three idiots were saying. And they were playing Connor into the palm of her hand.
Insert evil laugh here… Cordelia muttered to herself.
'Shut up, worthless human. I chose you for your proximity to the boy, not for any other reason.'
A wave of panic crashed through Cordelia. What do you mean?
Nosferatu laughed, a sinister sound that echoed through her skull like pounding hooves. 'You think I have plans for you? You, Miss Chase, are quite inconsequential in and of yourself. But your relationship to the boy…that's something I could never hope to recreate with any other being.'
Leave him alone! Connor's innocent, he doesn't know how this world works -
'That's what makes him so perfect. He has supernatural strength, a position to know the inner workings of the forces of Light, and an implicit trust in a puny human that will be his downfall.'
Connor sat next to Cordelia, smiling shyly up at her from beneath his mop of brown hair. So young, so innocent…he reminded her so much of Angel, with his soulful eyes and intense gaze. This boy, whom she had bathed, rocked to sleep, held close to her heart, and helped her realize that she could indeed love again, was the prey of an evil entity, wearing her face as its mask, and she was powerless to save him. Again.
'Watch as I turn Angel's precious son, the boy you see as your own, into my exclusive killing machine.'
God, no.
"Do you want to hang out or something?" Connor asked.
A grin spread across Cordelia's face. "I'd love to, sweetie. Why don't we go for a walk?"
------
"Finally!" Buffy cried as she signed the last student evaluation form. She leaned back in her chair and tilted her face to the ceiling. A plate of steak and potatoes was awaiting her when she got home, prepared by Anya, set aside by Willow, and wrapped carefully by Dawn.
As her gaze fell upon her desk, she smiled at a picture someone had taken at one of the Scooby meetings, one of the few she had ever framed, and the only one in existence that all of her friends were in.
They were gathered around her dining room table, books spread out before them, donut crumbs sprinkled over everything. Anya was sitting on Xander's lap, arms tightly wound around his neck while he tried to stuff a jam buster in his mouth. Dawn was asleep against Spike's shoulder, but he was mostly oblivious as he argued with herself over something. His gaze was so intense…but then again, so was hers. Does it go that far back? Buffy asked herself.
Giles and Willow sat next to each other, he with his face pressed close to a musty tome, she grinning goofily at the cameraperson. Ah, that's who it must be. Tara.
Buffy lifted the frame gently, bringing it close to her face to inspect it. There, reflected off her mother's glass curio doors, was Tara. Long blond hair hanging limp, camera obscuring her face, but it was her.
Fighting back the surge of tears that came unbidden to her eyes, she replaced the picture and gathered her stack of paperwork in her arms. To take her mind off the painful memories of Tara's death and the violent aftermath, the ache in her heart that always accompanied the memory of her mother and how she no longer existed when that picture was taken, and the thought that in a few months from that near-perfect moment her world came crumbling down around her, she ran through Operation: Robin Wood.
Dumping her mile-high pile of papers on the principal's desk, she looked carefully around the room for anything that seemed suspicious. Finding nothing, she then moved around behind the desk and tugged on the drawers. Paperclips, scotch tape, a bunch of pens and pencils…
"Poop," Buffy muttered to herself. With a frown, she closed all the drawers and sank into the principal's revolving leather chair.
"If I were an evil principal," she rationalized in a sing-song voice, "where would I hide my implements of mass destruction?" She Buffy twirled around and around on the chair, admiring the cherry oak desk, the curtained windows, the electric pencil sharpener, the curious paperweight…
It looked like an axe. An axe stuck in a big honking rock. Frowning, Buffy poked at it, inadvertently pressing down on the axe handle, which threw a switch inside the contraption. There was an ominous whirring, punctuated by a few clicks and clanks, and suddenly a panel was opening in the wall behind her.
She swung the chair around and watched in awe as a fiery red light shone upon her from within the sliding doors of the secret cabinet, illuminating the arsenal of weapons inside with a blood-like glow. What the hell does he need all this for? she asked herself.
Fingering an elegant dagger, the sneaking suspicion that she was meant to find something here at the school grew into a giant know in her stomach. Robin was up to something - what, she had no idea. But when she discovered what it was, she would put a stop to it.
------
After returning Robin's office to the way she had found it, Buffy walked through the parking lot to her car. Her mind was mulling over all the possibilities in her head, of the principal being evil, or good, or a demon…until she was attacked, that is.
Four Bringers, each armed with a flaming sword. "Geez, don't you guys ever give up?" she demanded. With a single roundhouse she knocked one enemy into another, sending them both sprawling to the ground. Flames licked her cheek as she side-stepped an attack, but she grabbed the Bringer's arm and with one solid twist it was broken.
The sword fell to the ground and she scooped it up, plunging it into the chest of the demon who had wielded it. As the two she had knocked down were struggling to their feet, the fourth tried to run her through. But she parried, thrust, and decapitated him.
Only two were left now, and she made short work of them, spinning and punching and slicing, not playing with them like she did the vampires she found on patrol. Given the chance, she knew the Bringers were skilled enough to kill her, especially with weapons as formidable as theirs.
But Buffy was fast, strong, and smart. So the demons barely had a chance to register her attack before they were lying in smouldering heaps on the ground. The Slayer stared out into the dark, daring any others nearby to attack. None did.
She shook the flaming sword in her hands. "Now how do I turn this damn thing off?" she asked herself, as every movement she made with it sparked blazing eruptions along its surface.
"It's powered by your own energy." Buffy whipped around, to find herself face to face with - herself.
"The First." It smiled her smile, laughed her laugh. The Slayer raised the sword between them.
"You know that can't hurt me," It scolded. Buffy looked at the sword and back at the bodiless demon.
"And that means you can't hurt me," she replied.
The First looked contemplative. "True. But I have a bit of inside knowledge on something that will hurt you. Or, rather, hurt someone you care about."
The image of Buffy blurred and dissolved, only to reform again in a more blonde, more leathery persona. "You leave him alone," she hissed, panic sweeping through her.
The fire on the blade winked out, and she strode angrily to her car. The First followed close behind, Spike's boots making the distinctive clomping she was so familiar with. She forced her eyes closed as she remembered the injuries he'd received while in the clutches of this being.
"It won't be me," It replied. Buffy tossed the sword into the passenger seat before climbing in and revving the engine. "No love, its someone with a little more, initiative."
Buffy paused, foot on the gas. "Riley?" she asked, in a smaller voice than she had expected. Not!Spike leaned in through the open window.
"The chip inside Spike's head was not meant for permanent use. It was an experiment. A trial." The First changed images again, quivering for a moment before solidifying as Maggie Walsh. "It's metal and plastic inside his brain. How long do you expect it should last - a year? Maybe two?"
It stepped away. "And how long has it been for your lover boy?"
"Three," she whispered. "Three years."
One final transformation, back into the Slayer. "Doesn't that concern you even the teeniest bit?"
Buffy threw the car into reverse and sped towards Revello Drive, her heart in her throat as her fear of losing Spike came once again to the fore of her mind. Behind her, the First stood grinning, a cold, malicious smile that seemed to chill the air around it. And in the shadows of the school, a figure moved, his dark skin swallowed by the equally dark night.
------
"Spike?" she called as she stepped in the door. Dawn and Jade glanced up from their homework. "Have you guys seen Spike?"
"You locked him in the basement, remember?" her sister replied.
Buffy headed into the kitchen and down the stairs, where she found the vampire chained to the wall, a copy of Shakespeare's 'Romeo and Juliet' in his hands. He looked up at her and smiled shyly.
"Evenin', love." Her step faltered, and she paused just out of his reach.
"Nothing…strange…happened today?" she asked. Spike could read the anxiety and fear in her face and body.
He cocked his head. "No, why?"
She searched his eyes, for what, he didn't know, and neither did she. But she seemed satisfied, because she closed the gap between them and pressed a demanding kiss on his lips. His cold hands gripped her waist and pulled her as close as they could manage with him still shackled to the wall.
When she noticed the jangling, Buffy sighed and disentangled herself from him. This made Spike pout and she laughed, her dire mood already lifting as she saw that he wasn't dead, or sick, or anything other than just himself.
Unchaining him, she noticed the adoring, trusting look he gave her, and her heart flipped. Suddenly she realized that if anything happened to him she would be absolutely devastated. Making herself a promise to never let anything come between them, she climbed into his lap and pressed herself against him, showing him with her lips exactly how serious that promise was.