"Now remember," Mr. Wells began, "just because you are smaller does not mean you are weaker. Use your small frame against them."
Beth let out pained grunt as she was yet again thrown against a brick wall. She pulled air back into her lungs with a strangled gasp and picked herself up off the ground. Of course, as she soon as she was up on her feet again, she was thrown through the air once more by the powerful swing behind what looked like a large club, and landed with a thud against the concrete ground.
"Oh, just tell her its weakness," Spike told Mr. Wells, wincing when she hit the ground again.
"Slayers need to be resourceful," Andrew responded sternly. "I can't just give her the answers." Spike leaned in menacingly and growled, making him eep! and throw the book up over his face.
"I got this!" she shouted, wiping her fingers over her split lip. She stood up on shaky legs and faced her opponent. The demon in question, hulking and a handful of ugly, narrowed its bulgy yellow eyes at her and let out a roar. It scraped its hooved foot against the ground, much like a bull in the cartoons did before charging. And then it actually charged, much to her surprise. She turned and ran, heading toward a blue dumpster.
"You must turn and face your opponent!" Mr. Wells called.
"Shut up and let me do this!" she shouted. She jumped on top a small crate, launching herself onto the top of the dumpster. She pushed herself off the brick wall behind it, spinning around and delivering a solid kick to the demon's chest. It only stumbled back a couple of feet and looked more irritated than hurt.
"Goddammit," she hissed, ducking as the club swung through the air right where her neck had been. Her father cringed at the club struck the dumpster, leaving a rather large dent. He took a step forward, but Andrew grabbed his sleeve. He could have dragged Andrew along with him, as the nerd's puny arm was no match for him, but he stopped anyway.
"She needs to do this on her own," Andrew told him. "You're not always going to be around to step in and save her. Believe in her, Spike. She can do this."
He huffed, but took a step back and leaned against the wall beside Andrew. Several yards away, Beth rolled out of the way as the demon swung the club down, trying to put a nice dent in her head, right where her face was. She knew that being on the ground was one hell of a disadvantage, but they seemed to keep meeting. It was really annoying. She scrambled to get away and gain footing again, but the demon grabbed her ankle and pulled her right back.
"Alright, I am sick of you!" she grunted, rolling over and kicking her steel-toed boot into the demon's chin. The demon's head snapped back and it let out a howl, which actually sounded pained for once. Quite shocked at the fact that she seemed to actually have hurt it, she forgot why she originally kicked the demon to begin with. By the time she remembered she wanted to move, the demon had already recovered, looking down at her with more murder in its eyes than before. Except, its chin was a bit red now.
"Ha!" she cheered. "I hurt it! I actually hurt it!" Her celebration was cut short as the demon grabbed her around the neck and lifted her into the air. It being several feet taller than her, she dangled, uselessly scraping her nails against its hands. She heard her dad call out her name and knew that if she didn't do something quickly, he would come over and gallantly save her. But she was a slayer now and slayers didn't need their dads to rush in and save the day. How lame would that be?
Thinking quickly and knowing she was going to so regret this later, she vamped out, actually startling the demon, who looked close to dropping her. It didn't, so she took her now long, sharp nails and raked them across the demon's face, right over its eyes. Describing what it felt like to drag her nails through something's eyes was not a tale she wished to retell, though she was damn happy when the demon dropped her, roaring loudly as it covered its eyes.
"See?" Andrew crowed proudly. "She can handle herself. She is very resourceful." Spike only unclenched his fists, a little less on edge now that his daughter wasn't possibly dying. When Buffy went out to fight the demons, Spike always had his concerns, but he knew she could take care of herself. He knew Beth could too, but he'd do just about everything to have kept her from becoming a slayer.
Beth, now having blinded the creature and finding out that it didn't like steel all that much, ran off to try and scavenge up a weapon made of steel. She couldn't be happier to been in a construction site. Finding a steel pipe, she took hold of it, and went back to take on the blinded demon. It was currently wandering around angrily, blood dripping down its face.
"Looking for me, big guy?" she called smugly, feeling better now that she had the advantage. The demon jerked its head in her direction and began to run at her. She waited until it got close enough before she thrust the steel pipe through its heart. It made a sizzling noise and the smell of cooking flesh overwhelmed her, but the demon didn't drop dead. Weird, considering the pipe was sticking out the back of it.
"Are you serious?" she asked the demon even though she knew it would only answer back with growls. Using the pipe, she swung the demon around, knocking it off its feet and sending it crashing to the ground.
"The Taragog Demon lack of central blood system," Mr. Wells announced loudly. "Stabbing it through the heart won't do you any good."
"I noticed!" she yelled as the demon got back up on its feet. It yanked the pipe out with a gross squelching noise, throwing it to the side and out of Beth's reach. She heard it clank against the concrete several yards away, no use to her now. Of course, she could burn it with the toe of her boots until it was too hurt to move, but that would take more time than she was willing to give it. So, out of ideas, she sprinted across the construction zone, hoping to buy herself some time. The demon followed her easily, probably better at hearing than seeing in general. Maybe it could even feel the tremors in the ground made by her pounding feet.
In an attempt to escape the raging demon, she climbed up a scaffold, trying to get to higher ground. She reached the top and peered down to see the demon at the bottom, huffing and scraping its hooves against the ground.
"Need me to take care of it, love?" her dad called out to her.
"No!" she snapped. She totally had this. She just needed to figure out how to get it. Every demon could be taken down. If you can touch it, you can kill it, her mother said. She just didn't know where smacking it worked best in her favor.
"She'll get this, "Andrew assured, looking at Spike's tense frame. He was realizing now maybe he shouldn't have allowed him along, spouting some Watcher-only nonsense. Of course, that would have meant facing the wrath of Spike, a very scary notion in and of itself.
"I can do this," she murmured, watching the demon pacing below her. "I can totally do this. I'm a goddamn slayer. A Vampire Slayer."
Growing impatient now that its prey had gone and climbed out of reach, the demon took hold of the scaffold and began to shake it. She gripped a bar to stop herself from sliding right off. Now seeing that the scaffold was not in fact secured, the demon began to rock it, trying to send it all tumbling to the ground. As she began to feel gravity assisting the demon, she jumped off, landing just as it crashed. The demon roared in triumph, rushing over to her. She quickly got to her feet and began running again, practically feeling Mr. Wells' disappointment. She sure heard his whine.
Beth picked up a shovel, it being the closest thing to a weapon she could find. Sure, slayers were taught that everything was a weapon, themselves included, but some weapons were better than others. Example: shovel was better than the tarp a few feet over.
She swung the shovel and it clanged against the demon's club. She took several strikes at is arms and legs, even causing bleeding, but the demon still kept coming, wildly swinging its club in hopes of making contact with her. She continuously dodged though, trying to come up with a plan to kill this thing. Mr. Wells said it had a weak point, but nothing she was hitting was a weak point. It was all pretty much the exact opposite. Everywhere she hit only seemed to make if more enraged and each swing became a bit faster, judging from the slipstream blowing her hair.
"Beth—"
"I got this!" she shouted angrily, smacking the demon in the head with the shovel. And then it hit her. Not the club of course, she ducked that again, but how she was going to win this. She hit the demon's head again, making it jerk to the side, opening up its neck to a hit. Acting quickly, she removed the stake from her waistband, jumping up and thrusting it into the demon's neck. She dragged it through its skin as the demon shrieked, trying to shake her off. Its protest choked out though as blood bubbled up its throat and dripped out its mouth. Blood spurted out from the wound, splattering across her neck and right arm. The demon began to falter and she jumped off, leaving the piece of wood still in its neck. The demon fell to its knees before slamming against the concrete, a pool of blood growing underneath it.
She let out a tired breath, wiping the demon's blood from her face. She spat out what had gotten in her mouth, making a disgusted face. Maybe she was vampire and maybe animal blood tasted fine, but demon blood was downright nasty. No wonder vampires didn't hunt demons. That food was gross.
"Its weak point was the back on its knees," Mr. Wells told her as she walked back over to them.
"I killed it, didn't I?" she asked, throwing up her arms in irritation. "Be resourceful, you said. I'm not going to waste my time trying to remember what demon can best be taken down where. Everything needs its head. And Nearly Headless Nick over there isn't getting up to fight another day here. Does anyone have any water?"
Her dad handed her a bottle and she took a large swig of it, spitting it out with the demon blood. "I can't believe it got in my mouth," she complained.
"Tastes a bit like piss, yeah?" her father asked with a grin.
She gave him a questioning look. "I wouldn't know to be completely honest, seeing as I've never drunken pee before."
Mr. Wells snorted, but covered it up by noisily flipping the pages of his demon guide.
"No need to get smart with me," Spike responded. "Now, let's take you home and get you cleaned up. You're a downright mess."
"You should see the other guy."
The loud sigh that emitted from her father's mouth gave Beth a little bit of her energy back. "I did see the other guy, an' I also saw what the other guy did to you," he remarked.
"Wait!" she shouted, remembering something. She ran back to the demon corpse and yanked her stake out of its throat. More blood poured out from the open wound, nearly getting on her boots. Boy did she hope this stuff washed out.
"You wanted your stake?" Mr. Wells ask as she returned.
"We've been through a lot," she informed him. "Never leave a solider behind, right? Or, I guess, a perfectly pointy piece of wood."
"Don' tell me you named it," Spike muttered.
"Of course I did!" she responded adamantly. "I call him The Stabinator." She thrust the stake through the air, attacking her invisible assailant.
Both Mr. Wells and her father stared at her with mixed emotions of their faces. Her watcher looked dumbfounded mixed with some condescension (he probably thought up about sixty better names in the last two seconds, the arrogant bastard) while Spike looked downright disappointed.
"I'm joking," she informed them, dropping her arm with a roll of her eyes. "Come on, if I was going to name a stake anything, it'd be 'Your Life at Stake.' Get it? Because it's a stake?"
Spike sighed again and exchanged looks with Andrew. "Let's go home now, yeah?"
"Okay, that was totally funny," Beth whined as the two men started to walk away. "Or should I say puny?"
"You put your mum to shame, now march young lady," her father called out.
She let out a loud breath, throwing one last look over at the corpse behind her. "Shouldn't we move the body?" she asked, catching up to her father and Watcher.
"Nah, let the scavenging demons eat'em," Spike told her.
"Ew, you mean like they pick off the meat?" she asked, her nose scrunched up in disgust.
"Entrails to eyeballs," he answered.
"Did you ever—"
"Vampires are not scavenging demons," he cut in, sounding almost offended.
"But what if you couldn't find fresh meat?" she went on to ask. "Hypothetically speaking, if we must, would you ever have?"
"No."
"What if you were gonna starve to death?" she asked, then thought for a moment. "Can vampires even starve to death?"
"Leave your questions for the Watcher, yeah?" he asked.
"Mr. Wells?" she asked, turning to face him.
He floundered for a moment before responding, "Probably, but we haven't tried."
"Haven' tried?" Spike asked, turning on him. "Haven' tried? What do you bloody do in that council of yours?"
"Starvation is not an efficient way to kill a vampire," he squeaked out, cowering under Spike's thunderous gaze. You could take the vampire out of the man, but not that man out of the vampire, Beth supposed. Or whatever fun little phrase explained why Spike was taking this all so personally. "So the Council never attempted to test out the method. It's assumed to be possible only because no known being can survive without sustenance."
The three approached Spike's car, Spike still grumbling about the whole starving vampire thing. He sure knew how to be dramatic.
"I am going to get blood all over your leather interior," Beth announced, opening up the back door.
"Put a towel down then," he ordered her.
She sighed, walking over to the trunk and opening it. She grabbed the closest thing she could find to a towel, which was rags more commonly used for cleaning cars. She didn't particularly feel agreeable about this right now, but she didn't know to what extent her father would go to keep his "baby" clean. She didn't get his love for the old hunk of junk (as she lovingly referred to it as), but her mother only rolled her eyes whenever she looked at it and sometimes Beth thought maybe she saw him talk to it. So yeah, she didn't want to sit on a bunch of rags, but she also didn't want to walk home.
"Took you long enough," he said when she came back, rags in hand.
"You don't have a towel," she informed him.
"Thought I did," he murmured, starting the car.
She got in the car, throwing her dad a scowl. "You don't."
When they arrived home, after leaving Mr. Wells at his apartment, Buffy was there to greet them when they came home.
"So, how did it go?" she asked, standing up from the chair she was in. She had a book in her hand, which Beth surmised was a way to look like she was doing something useful with her time while they were gone.
"Simone de Beauvior," Spike noticed, reading the cover of the book. "Never thought you'd be interested."
"Who?" Buffy asked dumbly. "Oh! The book! Yes, well, you know, Simone is wonderful. Her writing is…exquisite."
"It's in French," he told her.
She looked down at the book, flipping through the pages. "You know French?" she asked, confused.
"Je parle de nombreuses langues, mon amour," he responded with a grin.
"What?" she said. "Wait, no, not important. Forget the book." For emphasis, she threw it, making it hit the shelf and bring down a few books with it. Beth watched with mild amusement as the books thumped to the ground.
"Great toss, love," Spike said, suppressing a grin.
"It went well," Beth finally answered. "Everything died. Some quite violently too."
"Seems we got ourselves a demon detector here," Spike said affectionately, ruffling Beth's hair. "She told us to go up to some construction zone in Seattle and there was a nest of Taragog demons who'd been feastin' on the people."
Beth did her best to preen under the praise, despite the fact that she'd be as good as demon tracking as a rock. It seems Charlie had his uses and he'd yet to point her in the wrong direction. So far, she'd pointed them towards three vampire clans and almost a dozen demon lairs thanks to her In-The-Know Vampire Buddy. Never had slayers been so effective at demon extermination, but then again, never before had they had such an informed quasi-good vampire on their team who was so well-connected in the demon world. She had originally been concerned that the demons would soon pick up on him and go after him, making her lose her informant, but for whatever reason, demons respected him and thereby kept him up-to-date. Too bad for them it would seem, as her body count grew enormously.
"Wow, you got real lucky," Buffy congratulated. "He at least let you kill one of them, right?"
"We went in guns a'blazing for the nest and he let me take down one that had escaped the slaughter," Beth told her. "Took a while, but that son of a gun went down eventually. And bloodily, as you can see by my state of attire."
"Yeah, did you bite it or something?" her mother asked.
"No, but I stabbed it with my stake," Beth said, pulling it out of her pocket.
Buffy nodded. "Ah yes, The Stabinator."
Spike made a sound of disbelief and Beth turned to look at him. "Yeah, see, I lied about joking about that. Better than the other one at least, right?" He only shook his head.
"Now, go up and get yourself cleaned up," Buffy directed her. "Since Christmas break has officially begun, we can stay up and eat ice cream!"
"She's tired, love. She should get some sleep," Spike said.
"No I'm not so no I won't!" Beth shouted as she hurried up the stairs.
-.-
"We need to cover this before tonight," Mr. Wells said, cutting in through Beth's daydreaming. She looked up at him, scrawny yet stern, as he held an open book in one hand as he stopped pacing the floor of the study.
"You know," Beth began, sitting up in her chair, "Christmas break means no work and yet, what am I doing? Slayer work. That's work."
"This is more than just slayer work, Elizabeth," he replied, grabbing the lapel of his jacket. "This is pertinent to you especially. With this new breakthrough with the prophecy, there's more work to cover."
"I don't see how me being a slayer changes the prophecy," she muttered. "I'm supposed to save the world, aren't I?"
"'From the daughter of Samson,'" he began, "the cho—"
"I know the prophecy," she cut in tiredly. "You're not the only one who memorized it, you know. A vampire and slayer have a baby—that's me—and then comes a great evil and I'm the one who destroys it. See? I know the whole thing too."
He sighed and closed the book with a well-timed snap. He massaged the bridge of his nose, looking every bit like the tired Watcher he was now realizing he was going to become. Forget an entire slayer squad, Beth was enough work for him.
"We need to prepare you for anything," he explained, "the prophets were not kind enough to provide the finer details of this looming apocalypse, so we must remain vigilant! We don't know what's going to happen."
"It said something about fire and lightning, didn't it?" she asked rhetorically, already well aware of the answer. "And then some bit about 'destructive rage.' And then I come in, the less than demon but more than man and save the day, right?"
"Yes, but there's always more than just words to a prophecy," he replied. "Every single word is shrouded in layers of metaphors and symbolism. One has to search deeply to uncover the answer."
She rolled her eyes at his dramatics. Like most prophecies, it had its crypticness, but having seen the whole thing herself, it seemed pretty obvious what it meant: she good and destroy bad. Easy-peasy with a side of squeezed lemon.
"Come on Mr. Wells, not everything having to do with prophecies has to be difficult," she retorted. "And this one happens to be very straight forward."
His sudden discomfort didn't go unnoticed, especially not when he cleared his throat and started making a lot of eye contact with the ceiling. Her parents and Giles had talked a lot about the prophecy with her years ago, back when they first decided it was a good time to tell her about it. It had been the first time she had seen it in all its complete glory, though she had heard smidgens about it before. She'd been so shocked to learn that she was some prophetic child destined to be born to do some heroic duty, she'd gone and memorized each word to heart. But now her watcher's evasive and uncomfortable attitude made her suspicious. Andrew had always been more Watcher-ly with her until now, being permanently assigned and all, so he'd focused on honing in her skills and teaching her about demons, not talking about the prophecy foretelling her birth. Likely for good reason. He had a lot of tells.
"Well it is, isn't it?" she asked, pressing for an answer. She could tell from his stiff back that her tone was getting to him. While he was one to sugar coat things for her in his own way, he was never one to lie to her. He told her things in a grandiose fashion, but he never outright lied.
"Like I said, a lot of symbolism," he repeated in a high-pitched tone, nervous smile and all. "And with all that symbolism, well, nothing written is certain."
"Andrew," she growled warningly.
"Okay okay," he gave in, throwing up his hands. "Giles swore that I would never mention this to you, but the version you saw wasn't the real one."
She stared blankly at him, trying to wrap her mind around what he was saying. Was the prophecy not real? Did they make it all up so she could feel less like a freak and more like a freak with a purpose? Was it some lame way of making her confident and sure of herself?
"What we found was an incomplete version of the text. And what we did have, well-like I said, the wording was vague and there was a great deal implied –I mean, we couldn't make sense of the first part until your mother got pregnant—and with all those missing sections, it leaves a lot of room to go either way. So we may have filled in the blanks."
She recalled the translation of the prophecy she'd seen, the neat handwritten stanzas detailing her coming heroism. "So it doesn't say I save the world?" she asked, looking down at her hands. She'd always been stronger than the average girl her age, but now she was a slayer. "You all lied to me?"
Realizing some damage control was needed, Andrew rushed to sit beside her, taking her hands into her own. "This is why we didn't want to tell you," he confessed. "What was left of the real prophecy could easily be interpreted either way and we were pretty sure which way you would take it. So Giles and your parents decided it was best to show you the revised version."
"So you lied to me?" she asked, jerking her hands out of his and standing up. "You let me believe in some false prophecy so I wouldn't—what? Think I was going to destroy the world or something?"
"You're not," he insisted. "Beth, if anything, you're likely to be the world's greatest hero."
"I'm part vampire, Andrew," she reminded him coldly. "Vampires don't save the world."
"Your father did," he politely reminded her. "And so does Angel, quite frequently too."
"Why couldn't you have just been honest with me?" she asked.
He had the decency to look guilty, ducking his head and folding his hands between his legs. "We were trying to protect you."
"Well all you did was made it worse," she informed him. "You've all been lying to me for years; how is that supposed to make me feel? Happy that you tried to keep me in the dark? Because I'm not feeling too grateful about that now."
He didn't respond, not having the words. He probably was going to get in a lot of trouble for revealing this, but he thought she had a right to know. It was her life and she was old enough to be mature about it. Well maybe.
"And just in time for Christmas too," she muttered under her breath, chuckling humorlessly. "What a great gift it is too. You know I finally got around to learning the chords for Silent Night, but you can just forget about that. No one here is going to get graced with my lovely singing voice."
"That's alright," he soothed.
"You don't seem that disappointed," she noted. "You saying I sing badly?"
He cringed before responding, "No, I didn't say that."
"But you're thinking it."
"You play piano very well," he tried with a weak smile.
"Well thanks for letting me know I'm liable to destroy the world," she said scathingly. "Who knows, maybe I'll return your info-gift with one of my own and annihilate us all for Christmas."
"You're not going to destroy the world," he told her again, conviction in his voice.
"But you said what's left of the real prophecy is open to interpretation, didn't you? So how would you know? Besides, hasn't everyone always said the most dangerous thing out there is a Slaypire?"
He looked uneasy. "Well, yes, bu—"
"Well look no further for one, you're in the same room," she snapped before storming out, slamming the door shut behind her hard enough to make some of the books on the shelves rattle.
Andrew sighed, reaching up to rub his forehead. He had kept with him a copy of the original prophecy, the one written in Hebrew, in his briefcase since he was assigned as Beth's Watcher. The copy even had all of his scrawl on it, the English translation, the notes, the insights, everything he needed to try and piece together what it all meant. Sometimes he wondered if he and Giles and the other Watchers had picked the right words during translation. All it might take was one word change to throw the whole text into a new light and reveal its meaning. After all, it was the same translation they had used prior to Beth's birth, back when they didn't understand any line of it, let alone the first stanza, the only complete one and coincidentally, the part that foretold her birth. The rest of the lines were only parts, most of it burned away at some point before it fell into the Council's hands. If only they could find another copy, one not so ruined by time.
Beth raced down the stairs, fire building up in her stomach and crawling up her throat. How could they? Her parents were supposed to be her biggest supporters, not years-long liars who withheld important information from her! She skidded into the kitchen, maliciously happy that both her parents were there, their surprised faces looking up at her sudden arrival.
"'Lo, love," her father greeted. "Andrew done with you?"
"How could you lie to me?" she stressed, slamming her hand against the entryway to the kitchen.
Confused, Buffy and Spike exchanged glances. "What are you talking about, honey?" Buffy asked, a slightly amused look on her face. She wasn't sure exactly what Beth was going on about, and she really wanted to focus her attention on making the house look like the Homes & Gardens spread that existed only in her head (apparently, those snowflakes were really hard to make!). "I thought you already knew Santa wasn't real."
"Love," Spike warned, realizing that the anger rolling off of their daughter was much more than a little joke.
"Andrew told me," she barked at them, eyes narrowed. From behind her, she heard an eep! of surprise; Andrew must have heard her yelling and come down to try and diffuse what was becoming an increasingly more explosive interaction (and potentially run interference to keep Buffy from killing him). "I know that you lied about the prophecy! Made up a bunch of muck about it because you didn't have the decency to tell me the truth!"
Buffy's mouth hung ajar as she blinked at her daughter, before setting a positively murderouslook on Andrew. "You told her?" she hissed.
The grown man eeped! again, throwing up his hands as his last defense against the thunderous looks coming his way. Spike looked no less ready to throw hands than Buffy and he knew that man knew more than a couple ways to make things hurt real bad. "I'm sorry!" he apologized. "It just came out and—"
"You don't need to apologize Andrew," Beth cut in imperiously. "At least you had the bloody guts to tell me the truth, instead of lying to me like I'm some sort of child!"
Spike switched from glaring at Andrew, thinking of all the different ways he could string that man up for just dropping this very fragile news on Beth like it was a pile of rocks, before offering a pleading look at Beth.
"Love, look, s'more complicated than that," he tried.
"How?" she demanded, even going as far as stomping her foot. She could not believe her parents had done this to her; sure, they always tried to protect her, but this? This deceit went past anything they had ever done, and it was about her too. A piece that had been so vital to her life, the story that supposedly explained why she was even allowed to exist, and it wasn't even real.
Spike looked at Buffy, imploring her to have the right words that would soothe Beth's feelings of betrayal and somehow make what they did alright. But she could only look back at him forlornly, the same way she had looked at him when it had been suggested they make alterations to the prophecy. Beth had been five and already she had been a victim of her other-ness, as she learned why the other girls avoided her. So worried that she'd take it the wrong way, they had opted to modify the prophecy, hoping they'd have time to figure it out before the apocalypse came. It had weighed heavily on them then when they had made the decision, but they had felt it the best option, the only option. Of course, that was before they realized how quickly the narrative could spin out of their control.
"Beth, honey," Buffy began.
"So is it true?" she asked, her voice beginning to wobble. "You did. You sold me a load of rubbish because youdon't know if I'll save the world or destroy it."
"You are not going to destroy the world," Buffy snapped. She hated how the prophecy had been destroyed enough to hide its ultimate meaning, but not enough so that it hadn't put the thought into everyone's head when they realized it foretold Beth's birth. It had been the idea that had floated around—that one option just as likely as the other—coloring everyone's thoughts toward Beth. But Buffy refused; she knew her daughter. She could be quite chaotic when she wanted to (hello, trying to throw her bully through a portal using some sort of mystic device her aunt had), but she didn't rain down brimstone.
"How do you know that?" Beth cried, throwing up her hands. "You don't! You. Can't. Say. That!"
Before Buffy could say anymore, her daughter spun on her heel and stormed up to her room. She cringed with each loud step before wincing at the slam of her door.
"I cannot believe you just told her that!" Buffy hissed at Andrew, who cowered under her words. "You gave that information to her in the worst way possible!"
"I'm sorry!" he cried helplessly. "It just came out! You know I'm no good with lying. And with her being a slayer—clearly it must be pertinent to the prophecy—"
"An' you jus' couldn' keep that line of questioning to yourself," Spike finished with a growl.
"I didn't realize how quickly she would take it the wrong way," he defended. "I only told her it was much more vague than she'd been shown and she quickly assumed she could be the instigator of an apocalypse. I said nothing of the such!"
Buffy really sometimes wondered if there truly was no one more competent to teach Beth. As someone who proclaimed to understand her dramatic, wayward daughter, Andrew sure seemed completely lost when it came to recognizing her triggers. Of course she would take that the wrong way! Jesus, was this man also not a witness to the bullying Beth experienced at the academy?
"Well, you can just forget about coming to our Christmas party!" Buffy hissed, throwing up her hands. She was supposed to spend this time hanging garland, not convincing a hormonal teenager that she wasn't going to destroy the world!
Andrew gasped, his eyes going wide. "I was invited?" he whispered.
"You invited him?" Spike hissed at her.
"He's her watcher!" she spat back before glaring at the man in question. "But you can just forget that now!"
"We can fix this," Andrew pleaded. "Just give her some time. It's all very surprising information to her and she just needs time to sort it out."
Buffy looked up at the ceiling, where she just knew Beth was away, skulking in her room. This was not something she expected to go over easily.
-.-
Beth stood underneath the archway into the lounge, frowning into her cup of apple cider which was progressively getting colder the longer she stared at it.
"I can't believe they let Andrew be your Watcher," Jackie commented, watching as the man in question seemed to be boring Mr. Woods with long, drawn-out discussions of pop culture theory. "Is he even qualified?"
She shrugged noncommittally. "No one else wanted the job, so he was kind of my only option. I could have gone back to the academy, but could you imagine that?"
He looked down at her and noticed her depressed mood. "With the amount of attention that cider is getting, I would think you'd thought it's more interesting and attractive than me."
"It does have a nice color to it," she admitted, tilting her head as if in admiration.
"Something bothering you?" he asked, always the concerned older brother.
She sighed, finally looking away from her drink. "A couple of days ago Mr. Wells informed me that I've been lied to about the prophecy revolving around me."
"What? That it's not about you?" he asked. "Does that mean you can stop obsessing over it?" Having known her since she was a baby, Jackie knew a thing or two about her. It also meant he'd heard a thing or two about her prophetic birth, and the whole divined purpose of it. Beth got to be a strange amalgamation of human and vampire so she could protect the world from utter devastation. It was destiny. It was duty. It was boring to keep hearing about.
She smacked him on his chest. "Ow," he chuckled, rubbing the area. "For a slayer, that was really weak. My exes hit harder than you."
"I do not 'obsess' over the prophecy," she argued.
"No, you're right, you didn't obsess over it," he drawled, "you just spent an inordinately large amount of thinking about what the prophecy was for and when it would happen, and how you would save humanity. No, not obsessive at all."
"It never says anything about me saving the world," she admitted to him.
He frowned, looking at her curiously. "Yeah it does. You saw it. You repeated it all line for line and word for word to me enough times that I could probably recite it in my sleep."
"It was faked," she went on to explain. "They created a revised version because the one they had wasn't clear what my role is. My parents lied to me."
"Is that why your dad is giving you those sad puppy-dog eyes?" he gasped, glancing up at Spike, who did indeed look like Beth had kicked him.
"He's a rotten liar."
He sighed. "And your dad who cares a lot about you. Are you saying it's some sort of doomsday prophecy and that you might be the harbinger?"
She nodded solemnly.
"That's dumb." Her head snapped up to meet his determined gaze.
"It's not dumb," she argued. "It's conceivable, completely conceivable! I am stronger than any slayer ever and I have a vampire soul in me and vampires like chaos and destruction! I could totally destroy the world if I wanted to!"
He rolled his eyes. He had forgotten how dramatic teenagers could be. "Exactly. If you wanted to. I fully believe that you have the capabilities to watch the world burn as you drink blood from a skull—"
"Okay, ew?"
"—but you not going to. You're Elizabeth 'Walk the Thin Line' Summers who's afraid if she does anything remotely morally ambiguous, she'll get roasted in a spigot over hell's flames."
"That's a very winded way of saying I'm afraid of being judged wrong, but sure," she agreed. "That doesn't mean—"
"That you still can't go rogue?" he finished and she nodded. "I'll take my chances, honest."
"This is serious, Jackie," she urged. "Who knows what sort of path I could be on? I could be capable of so much bad stuff."
He studied her face, seeing the true fear she had in her eyes. It wouldn't matter how many lives she saved or good she did, she'd always fear she was capable of doing much worse. "And if you ever destroy the world, I will personally shave my head and become your evil henchman," he promised. "I'm always going to be on your side."
She laughed lightly, a small smile creeping out onto her face. "Why do you have to shave your head?" she asked. "You look good with dreadlocks."
"Because have you ever seen a bad black guy henchman without a shaved head?" he asked. "No? That's what I thought. Now, come on you wonderful girl you, let's provide tonight's entertainment. You look too good in that dress to stand around sulking." He grabbed her wrists, nearly making her spill her apple cider, and dragged her over to the piano.
"The dress isn't even mine," she admitted, looking down at her red cocktail dress. "It's my mother's."
"Your mother has wonderful taste then."
"And the shoes are hers too. She has such small feet, you know. I wonder how she keeps her balance."
"A question men have been asking about women for all these years, now sit." He pushed her down onto the piano bench, taking her drink from her hands.
"Hey! I was drinking that!" she protested.
"No, you really weren't. You were making intense eye contact with it, which is not the same thing as drinking it. I want you to play and forget any of these nasty thoughts you have about your prophecy and just remember that your parents love you, and it makes them do stupid things."
"You want me to just forgive my parents?" she asked skeptically.
He sighed, sitting down beside her, hands resting on the keys. "Beth," he began, sounding put-out with her moping, "your parents love you more than their lives. You are their lives. And I know they would do anything to protect you, even if that means lying to your face because they're afraid you'll think the wrong thing. They want you to love yourself and never question that. So, yes, forgive them because they messed up. And because your dad looking that pathetic is making me feel bad for him. And I shouldn't feel that! He killed my grandma. Now play."
"So bossy," she mumbled, but obliged. She glanced up at her dad, who was still occasionally sneaking looks at her. No one was supposed to be sad on Christmas so she offered him a small smile, one that made his eyes light up just a little.
"But so irresistible to all the ladies," Jackie assured with a grin she couldn't help but replicate. "So, who's ready for my rendition of Santa Baby?"
-.-
Imogene wrapped her jacket tighter around her as the wind whipped ferociously against her skin. It wasn't snowing, but the weather forecast promised it. A white Christmas, they said joyfully. She only groaned knowing that Baba didn't take holidays and would expect her to brave the weather for whatever "needs" he had.
She entered the damp cave, which was worse with the frigid wind. The rocks were icy and she nearly took a violent fall on numerous occasions as her boots slid across the slick surface. She was too old for this and would likely break a hip. Maybe that would show Baba a thing or too. She snorted derisively. No, he'd probably expect her to show up, injuries be damned.
"Finally, you have arrived," he announced when she entered the antechamber of the cave. The wind didn't reach this far, though it was no warmer even with the torches lit along the cave wall. He didn't seem cold though. In fact, he stood there in long pants and a thin long-sleeved shirt, unperturbed by the temperature as she stood there shivering violently. What she wouldn't give for a hot coffee.
"Action must be taken soon," he said, walking back and forth across his raised rock. If it wasn't for the fact that she knew he was talking to her, the way he refused to look at her made him look like he was talking to himself. It was like she wasn't even there!
"I have situated myself in the community," she assured him, teeth chattering away. She barely got the words out without biting off her tongue. "No one suspects a thing, much less those witches."
"We need to hurry," he told her. "Simply being present is not enough."
"But what about the slayer?" she asked. "She's going to be trouble."
"A slayer?" he asked, laughing. "I've heard of the great Buffy Summers. Great fighter, but as quick-witted as the dirt beneath my feet. She won't suspect a thing. As long as she stays uninformed, we'll be safe."
"So we just go in for the kill?" Imogene asked.
"Yes," he answered. "But we'll need to assess this carefully. Any wrong move will tip off Buffy Summers and all our plans will be ruined. We must free our Great Destroyer."
"Maybe we can send someone after the slayer," she offered. "I can call up several demons and task them to go after her. Immobilize her. Getting her myself would be too difficult, after all."
"Then make a plan for it," he snapped. "Don't drag your feet like you have. I want to fulfill the prophecy as soon as humanly possible. Immortality awaits us, Gene, and the longer you wait, the older you'll get."
She nodded, grumbling to herself. While she did all the dirty work, all Baba had to do was stand around, twiddling his thumbs until she got his work done. Who put him in charge anyway, she wanted to know? She sure didn't remember voting for him.
A/N: ohohoho, we are now finally beginning to delve into this mysterious prophecy, and the whole underlying thing that ties all these stories together. Don't worry though, this isn't the last time you'll hear about it!