Disclaimer: Not mine. It's Joss's. May Epileptic Caffeine Hamsters plague him. Any resemblance to other characters, real or fictitious, is simply in your imagination. And no, I didn't ask first.
A/N: Mild crossover, stole some concepts from other fics (Allyn 'Ayonge-Chan'
'Bloodfist'; CarrotGlace 'Permanent') and amped it.
Vignettes (Chapter 3)
Episodes 3, 4, and 5 are pretty much filler, so I'm just doing scenes where
different things happened. The episodes pretty much play out as they do in
the show, except for the sections I've rewritten. There are differences
between what happens in this reality vs. canon that I am not enumerating.
Episode 3: The Witch
Buffy sits, watching the cheerleaders stretching prior to tryouts. Alex and Cordy sit with her in the bleachers.
"Not gonna try out, Buff?" Alex asks.
"No."
"Why not?" Cordy asks, shifting some on the bleacher. She didn't know why,
but being around the Slayer for long periods of time made her...edgy. "You
used to do this quite a bit. I can tell."
Buffy sighs. "Listen, I appreciate your concern, but...cheerleading...not my thing anymore." She looks around the gym casually before looking back down at the cheerleaders almost wistfully. "I am what I am."
"And what are you?" Alex asks, tearing his attention away from the girls in skimpy clothes.
"A wolf among sheep." Buffy says, absently. "As you have, I gave up my peace in order to preserve the future. So that those girls down there can smile, and laugh, and talk abut boys, and get married, and maybe have a house with a white picket fence and 2.4 kids." She turns to face Alex, eyes hard. "I would love to be nothing but a cheerleader again. But that's not me anymore. I am The Slayer."
Cordy shivers. "That's not all you are, Buffy, and you know it."
Buffy snorts humorlessly. "Maybe. Come on, let's go." She stands, and the other two join her. As they approach the door, Buffy stiffens slightly, and stops. "Something's...wrong." She truns, and looks over the gym again. One of the cheerleaders, having just finished an impressive display, seems to be smoking slightly. The Slayer's eyes narrow. Suddenly, the cheerleader drops her pom-poms, and screams. Her hands are literally on fire. Buffy curses, and vaults to the top of the stands, grabs a banner, and runs to her, knocks her down and snuffs out the flames with the banner. Alex and Cordy spread out, and start looking around the gym for anything out of place while eveybody else stares in shock.
"It's a bloodstone vengeance spell. Hits the body hard like a, a quart of alcohol, and then it e-eradicates the, uh, immune system." Giles says, calmly.
"So, what do we do?" Alex asks.
"About this?" Giles walks over to the counter, apparently unconcerned.
"Nothing. She'll be fine in an hour, two at the most. Frankly, I'm surprised
it even affected her at all..." He picks up a book begins to read.
"Sheerly out of morbid curiosity, what would happen if, say, a normal human got hit by this spell?" Alex asks, morbidly curious.
"Within twenty-four to fourty-eight hours, they'd be dead." The librarian responds without looking up from his book. "If Buffy wasn't the Slayer, she'd have another hour, at the most. But she is."
Episode 4: Teacher's pet
"Well! Look who's here!" Buffy says, sarcastically.
"Hi." Angel replies.
"I'd say it's nice to see you, but then we both know that's a big fib."
"I won't be long."
"No, you'll just give me a cryptic warning about some exciting new catastrophe, and then disappear into the night. Right?"
"You're cold."
"You can take it."
"I mean, you look cold." Angel says, beginning to take off his jacket. He stops at Buffy's glare. Well, that and the really pointy chunk of wood poised just in front of his heart.
"You know, I can't quite believe you're actually trying that one...on me!
Hello, Vampire Slayer here." She looks him over. He appears quite a bit the
worse for wear. "Alright, what happened?" She sounds resigned.
"I didn't pay attention."
"To somebody with a big fork?" She pushes up one sleeve of his jacket,
revealing a series of parallel scratches.
"He's coming."
"The Fork Guy?"
"Don't let him corner you. Don't give him a moment's mercy. He'll rip your throat out."
"Okay, I'll give you improved marks for that one. Ripping a throat out, it's a strong visual, it's not cryptic!"
"I have to go." Angel turns and leaves as quietly as he came.
"Pfeh. Vampires."
Alex wanders up behind her. "So you know Angel, huh?"
"Yeah. He seems to like giving me cryptic warnings."
"He's good at that." Cordy says, coming in from the other side.
"Where'd you guys meet him, anyways?"
"We crashed some kinda underground pit fight. Heard there were some people there who hadn't come voluntarily. Turns out it was just him. They were bidding over the rights to tear him apart."
"Mornin'. Guess what I just heard in the office? No Dr. Gregory today. Ergo,
those of us who blew off our science homework aren't as dumb as we look." Alex
says, with a smile.
"What happened, is he sick?" Buffy asks.
"They didn't say anything about sick, something about missing."
"He's missing?"
"Well, let me think. Um, the cheerleaders were modeling their new short skirts, that kinda got... Yeah! Yeah, they said missing." Cordy and Buffy exchange a look. "Which is bad?"
"If something's wrong, yeah!"
"He's one of the only teachers that doesn't think Buffy's a felon." Cordy says drily.
"Oh? Well, I'm sure he'll..." He looks up and sees Miss Natalie French walking toward them. "I, uh, huh..." The girls look to see what's distracting him. She comes right up to Xander, who just stares at her.
"Could you help me?" She asks.
"Uuuuuuhhhhhh...Yes..." He says slowly. Cordy and Buffy give each other amused looks.
"I'm looking for Science... 109."
"It's right over that way, Miss..."
"French. Natalie French." She gives Alex a warm smile, and offers him her hand. He takes it slowly, and shudders slightly, goosebumps forming on his arms. She shakes his hand once, and then releases.
Cordy frowns slightly as she notices the goosebumps. Her frown deepens when shadows begin forming on the surface of Alex's skin.
"If you could direct me there...?" Natalie smiles prettily again. From behind her, another young man approaches.
"Hi! Blayne Mall. I'm going there right now. It's not far from the varsity field where I took All-City last year."
"Oh! Thank you, Blayne!"
She and Blayne leave. Xander's gaze follows them, and then Cordy touches him on his shoulder. "Alex...?" She asks, quietly.
The shadows begin to fade. "There's...something deeply wrong about her."
The park. Late at night. Buffy jumps the fence, and begins to patrol the area, carefully looking around. A bum comes up to her, startling her.
"Shouldn't be out here at night, little lady. Dangerous." He says, before departing. She smiles at his back.
Continuing to look around, she finds another bum laying on the ground. She
checks him out, and after finding that she's okay, continues into the
shrubbery. Eventually, she finds one that's loose and tugs on it. And then
suddenly drops to one side, as a gleaming silver set of claws come at the back
of her head. She rolls to her feet, and kicks claw guy in the stomach,
knocking him back a few feet. He charges madly, and Buffy grabs his arm and
tosses him, as hard as she can, into the ground. He springs to his feet, and
Buffy jumps backward, evading that glistening claw. As she lands, she draws
her gun, and fires once at the vamp. He dodges, and the bullet impacts his
lower torso, unfortunately for Buffy not striking any bones.
Flashlight beams stb the air. "Drop your weapons! This is the police." A voice shouts out into the air.
Buffy looks back and forth between Fork Guy and the posse. The vampire runs off.
"I heard it. Spread out. Let's go over here. This way, this way. Alright..."
Buffy makes tracks after Claw Guy. Natalie is walking home on the other side
of the park fence with grocery bags in her arms. The vampire stalks her and
climbs over the fence. Buffy comes running up. The vampire lands behind
Natalie. Buffy reaches the fence and watches, gun aimed. Natalie senses the
vampire, stops and turns to face him. Fork Guy hisses and runs away in fear.
Natalie watches him go. Buffy can't believe what she's seeing. The vampire
crosses the street, lifts a manhole cover and climbs down. Natalie continues
her walk home. Fork Guy pulls the manhole cover back into place. Buffy can
only stare after Natalie, jaw dropped.
"Keep your eyes straight ahead on your own test." Natalie comes up behind Alex, and, in a low voice, says "I think you meant 'pollination' for number fourteen." She rests her hand on his shoulder. "I'll see you here after school." She smiles down at him, and trails her hand across him sensuously as she walks away. All the muscles in Alex's back are tense, and his right fist is clenched so hard that he's cutting himself on his nails.
Buffy comes running to class and looks in through the door window. "Oh, great,
a pop quiz." Watching through the door for a moment, Buffy sees Natalie
straighten, and turn her head around 180 degrees. Her eyes go wide with
amazement. She quickly rolls away from the window.
Natalie is at the desk spreading butter on a slice of bread. She's about to open a plastic container when she hears Alex come in and looks up.
"Hi." He says, gaurdedly.
"Oh, Hi! I was just grabbing a snack. Can I fix you something?"
"No thanks, I never...eat when I'm making egg sacks." Alex says, looking down at the model. "If this were real the bugs would be-"
"As big as you!" Natalie finishes.
"As big as me." Alex says gravely. He hesitates a moment, and then shrugs.
"Fuck it." Shadows flood his face and arms, and his overmind flared, showing
things as they truly were. "Demon." He whispers, staring at the giant bug where
Miss French had been.
She stares at him, confused. "What?" She asks. "What are you-" She doesn't get the chance to finish as Alex slugs her brutally in the stomach. A sharp crack sounds, as chitin cracks from the impact, and Natalie is flung through the air, smashing through a cupboard before she hits the wall. Her body seems almost to melt and reform, and then she stands revealed as the Praying Mantis she is.
Episode 5: Never kill a boy on the first date.
"Well, I-I don't know exactly, a-a-a-a warrior, but, but it says he will rise from the ashes of the Five on the evening of the thousandth day after the Advent of Septus."
"Well, we'll be ready whenever it is." Buffy says.
"Which is tonight."
"Tonight, okay...Dammit. Stupid centuries old prophecies. Why does it have to be tonight?
"My calculations are precise."
"Buffy has a really important date." Cordy adds, unhelpfully.
"Owen!"
"Alright, I-I'll just jump in my time machine, go back to the twelfth century and ask the vampires to postpone their ancient prophecy for a few days while you take in dinner and a show."
"Okay, at this point you're abusing sarcasm."
"Buffy, this is no ordinary vampire. But we have to stop him before he reaches the Master."
"But... Cute guy! Teenager! Post-pubescent fantasies!"
"Those will just have to be put on hold! The dark forces are aligning against us, and we have a chance to beat them back. Tonight we go into battle!"
"Yeah...I know." Buffy sighs deeply. "I just...never mind."
Xander fumbles with the box. Buffy and Willow look over at him. The door bell rings.
"That's Owen!" Buffy says excitedly. She runs downstairs and flings the door open. "That's Giles." She says, without much interest.
"We need to talk."
"Great."
Giles pushes the door open and comes in without waiting for permission. "My calculations may not have been as far off as I thought." He says, holding up a paper.
"'Five Die in Van Accident'?" Buffy asks quizzically.
"Out of the ashes of five shall rise the one. That's the prophecy. Five people have died!"
"In a car crash."
"I know it doesn't quite follow, but, but it's worth investigating. Look!
Among the dead was Andrew Borba, whom the police sought for questioning in a
double murder. Now, he may be the Anointed One. The, the bodies have been taken
to, to Sunnydale Funeral Home, w-we can..."
"Why can't I ever do something normal?"
"I beg your pardon?"
Owen shows up at the open door. "Hey!" He comes in. "Uh, hi!"
"You have a date?" Giles asks, incredulously.
"Yes. Is it that hard to imagine? I'll take care of it, Giles."
"Wait, you're not getting off that easily."
"Uhm, what's going on?"
"Owen..." Buffy says, sighing. "Something's come up, and I have to take care of it right away. I'm sorry...maybe we could reschedule our date for tomorrow night?"
"Uhm...yeah...sure, I guess."
"Oh, thank you." Buffy smiles brilliantly at him, and then hugs him.