We don't own D. We don't own Buffy or any of her friends, but if anyone knows where we can rent Willow and/or Tara at a good rate, please let us know.
This story is a collaboration between MK and Isoner. Rated PG-13, for now.
Sight Seeing
'For so much to be different,' Buffy thought, 'so much is the same as normal'. Willow, Tara, and Anya was researching with Giles to try and figure out what sort of Apocalypse was about to unfold, while Xander was sent on food runs, and she being a dutiful slayer was patrolling the local cemeteries and Demon haunts. All and all it was business as usual except that she was not in Sunnydale, the small town that seemed to be the epitome of the all American town, that just happened to be built on a hellmouth. Nope, here she was in a small town in England, with no hellmouth to be seen. This thought made her smirk as she thought to herself, 'Guess Sunnydale doesn't have the monopoly on apocalypses after all.'
It had all started about a week ago when Giles had received a telegram. It had been a from a friend or a fellow watcher, or as far as Buffy knew, both could have been the case. It had been simple and to the point, it asked him to bring the slayer. Giles was prepared to bring his young charge…except that Buffy had been adamant about bringing her support team. She could still remember telling Giles that the group could find out more information quicker than the stuffy tweed shirts in the watchers any day, besides she could probably use the back up of two witches, an ex-demon, and well Xander could always provide military knowledge, and had a knack of breaking up the tension that came about by intense research and the killing of the creatures that they fought. Things had just blossomed from there as Dawn had told their mom that she should get to go too, and her mom said it would be a good experience for Dawn to see England, and she needed a vacation herself. She still wasn't sure how they had managed not only to come along, but a nice hotel room downtown on top of it. Things had gotten even stranger when she had received a telegram from the love sick Spike telling her that he would be arriving soon.
Once they had actually arrived in this ideal small port town, they immediately discovered that Giles long lost buddy that had sent them the warning was now the newest resident of the local morgue, and that his house had been ransacked. Now the others were trying to make heads or tails out of what they could find of the mans possessions to figure out what he had been working on that had been dangerous enough to need their help. So while they were having that fun, Buffy was walking around town to speculate on other cosmic events, such as why all cemeteries looked the same after dark no matter where in the world they were located. At least the jetlag was working to her advantage.
She sensed an unnaturalness coming up behind her. She would never understand why vampires always fell for her 'innocent girl strolling through the graveyard' routine. She turned to face them trying for one of her trademark quips, and found that one was just not coming to her at the moment. "Oh forget it, its been a busy night and I just too tired." She spoke into the face of the lead vampire. Her high kick sent him sprawling and by the time the second vampire realized what had happened, Buffy's stake had hit home and he was crumpling to dust around it.
She turned to face the first vampire still lying on the ground and spoke to him, "This is the part where you look all shocked and amazed then say something all inane like 'die slayer'."
He didn't. Instead, he lunged at her growling. He didn't stand, he simply went from lying prone on the ground, to a full fledge flying at her throat. She barely dodged the attack by stepping back, and managed to block his next three blows with her arms. She winced thinking of the bruises she would have in the morning. Then she sensed another presence coming up behind her and knew that she had to end this one quickly. With one as powerful as this one she didn't want to be ganged up on. "You must be older than you look. It's been awhile since I have faced one as powerful as you. How old are you? 5?" She smiled when she realized that he was going to take the bait.
The onslaught paused as he pulled himself up and in a haughty tone glared down at her, "I'll have you know that I am over two thous…" Startled he looked down to find himself impaled on Buffy's stake. "Oh Shi…" was heard as he crumbled to dust.
Buffy didn't even turn, instead she relied entirely on instinct and rolled forward. Even as she did so, she could feel the air rush past from the missed blow across her back. She came up with a roundhouse kick that landed, knocking the newest vamp down. Not waiting for him to get up, she was on him in a heartbeat, her stake landing, turning him to dust as well.
Standing she realized that she was breathing heavily. How long had it been since she had had that kind of workout, and still she knew that she wasn't done. There was one more out there, she could sense it, and this was a powerful one too. All of her extra training with Giles was paying off in the advance-warning department of her slaying abilities, still, she couldn't pinpoint where it was. Shaking her head to clear it she continued on.
A little farther on Buffy found something that she hoped that she wouldn't. The vamps last meal, a family. A man, woman and daughter, definitely dead, with the tale tell puncture marks on their necks. She checked them carefully and found that they wouldn't be coming back changed.
As she was standing from looking over the bodies she found that the fourth vampire was now close, very close. Relying on her instinct once more she brought her stake up in time to block the blow. The sword nearly cleaved the wooden stake in half, and probably would have if the blow hadn't been halted by the attacker.
"You're no vampire." The man said.
Buffy gave the man a once over. Pale complexion, fangs, fashion sense twenty years out of date at least. "No, but you are." She said as she plunged the mostly broken stake into his chest.
The man threw his head back and howled, his fangs elongating in his mouth. Buffy had never heard such a cry of anguish and pain before, then she felt something hot and wet hit her hand. Looking up she saw his shirt darkening with the color of blood. "Oh god." She stammered out, her mind quickly replaying a scene from her past, where Faith staked the Mayor's assistant. In that moment she knew the feeling that Faith had went through. Her mind babbling, horrified, 'not a vampire, human. I've killed a human.' Then the screaming stopped as he fell to the ground.
"Oh god. What do I do?" Scooping the man up she started to carry the man to Giles.
Xander walked into the house where they were doing the research and set down the food he had picked up from the pub down the street. Pulling out the sacks he set them down and looked at the group. "Here I have brought what they tried to tell me was food, for the much needed research sustenance. I hope fish and chips are alright with everyone." Seeing there nods of agreement he sat down and began doling out the food to everyone. "Well gang what have we found out?"
"Not much of anything really." Willow answered. She looked up from the book she was reading and idly reached up her hand to softly stroke Tara's blonde hair.
"Mr. Giles, do you know anything about this Barbarroy?" Tara softly spoke.
"Barber Roy. Yeah he works down at barber shop." Xander quipped taking a bite of french-fry. "Guh. Is their any salt. That has got to be the blandest french-fry I have ever tasted.
"Yes Xander, I am quite sure everyone here knows of your dislike of English food. Now what were you saying Tara." Giles gave Xander a look.
Tara gingerly picked up a piece of paper that was splattered in blood and held it out for the watcher to see. "There was a mention of a demon called Barbarroy in his journal, then I came across this piece of paper. It is the only thing written on it, so I thought it might mean something to you."
Giles noticed the blonde witch trying to hold the paper without touching any of the bloodstains. He walked around the table to take the piece of paper out of her hands. Looking at it he saw that there was indeed only one word on the paper. "Barbarroy? I can't say that it rings any bells. Anyone else?" He looked around at the group of young people and noticed Anya had gone pale. "Anya, do you know anything about them?"
"I know enough to stay away from him." She answered.
Giles sighed as he asked, "Is there anything else you can add?"
"Barbarroy was something of a mercenary… Mercenaries and Vengeance Demons don't socialize much."
"Yes, be that as it may, we should probably get some rest, and begin bright and early tomorrow morning on research." Giles began when suddenly the door burst open. Whirling around he realized something was drastically wrong when he saw a panic stricken Buffy holding a man, who apparently had a stake through his heart.
The others stood, just looking at each other, and wondering what to do. Strangely enough it was Tara who stood up to take charge. "Giles could you go get me some warm water. Buffy put him on the couch, then go upstairs and find me some rags, towels, anything like that. Anya find me something to prop under his head, and Willow get our bag with our supplies in it." She then went over to the man on the couch once she saw that the others were moving to do her bidding. When Willow returned with their bag she took out the scissors, and cut his shirt off of him. Looking up it appeared that he was unconscious. When everyone had retuned she put the warm water down on the floor and put some herbs that were good for disinfecting and pain killing into the water, then with Buffy's help placed a pillow under his head. Cutting up the towel that Buffy had brought she put it in the pan of water, and then started wiping the blood off his chest, cleaning the wound as best she could, and held slight pressure around the stake.
"Giles, oh god, Giles, h-he was human." She paced around the couch, hovering between Giles and the wounded man. "I killed a human, like Faith. Giles." Buffy stuttered out as tears began coursing down her face.
"Bloody Hell!" Giles ran over to the man and began to check him over. Placing his hand on his neck he felt a faint pulse. "He's still alive. Call an ambulance." With the man's pale complexion, and slightly pronounced incisors Giles could see why his slayer had made the mistake, but it was a mistake a Slayer could not afford to make.
"No. No ambulance." The mans voice was raspy but strong and commanding. He continued, "Dig a shallow hole. Bury me. Leave my head uncovered."
"Wha…" Xander began.
"Do it." The man ordered in a flat tone taking time to look at everyone in the room.
They all looked at him and Giles still looking into the man's eyes spoke, "Xander, find a shovel and dig him a hole."
When Xander came back inside to say that he had the hole dug, he and Buffy picked him up gently and carried him out the door that Giles held open for them. Xander noticed that the man was tall, but thin as Buffy placed his head and upper body down into the hole making sure that his head had plenty of space to be outside of the hole when they placed the dirt over him. Xander then lay his feet and legs into the hole and began filling in the dirt over him as he requested. When the two had finished the task they looked up at Giles.
"Buffy. What happened?" Giles asked the slayer gently. She looked like she was about to jump out of her skin.
"I was patrolling the cemetery. I had killed three vampires, but I felt another presence. It felt, old, powerful. I had just found the family that the other vampires had finished feeding on when this guy comes up. I blocked his sword with my stake, and I remember thinking that it should have cut through the stake. Then he looked at me and said that I wasn't a vampire. I looked at him, and he was pale, and he had these fangs, besides did you see what he is wearing, I mean come on, he looks like an 70's fashion victim." Buffy babbled out. "I didn't realize that he was human. He looked like a vampire, I mean he had fangs. Or at least I thought he did." Buffy looked down at her feet looking guilty.
Giles patted Buffy on the shoulder and then spoke, "We can talk more about this in the morning. It is getting late and we have had a long day, so let's just call it a night and get some sleep."
"Ok, but I don't get dead guy room." Buffy nodded and leaned into Giles for a moment taking some comfort in Giles presence as they walked back into the house.
"Yes, well I was going to sleep in there, and give Willow, Tara, and you the other bedroom, and put Xander and Anya on the couch." Giles started to explain when he was interrupted by Anya.
"But I wanted a bed to play shiver me timbers with Xander." Anya huffed, "and why did you bury that guy anyway?
Xander awoke to the sounds of Giles and the others fixing breakfast in the next room. Once again, Anya had managed to keep him awake far longer than he had planned. It had certainly been enjoyable.
He yawned and stretched, putting his feet on the cold floor. Speaking to whoever bothered listening, "You know I had the strangest dream. I dreamt that we buried some guy alive in the flowerbed. Sleeping in dead guy's homes certainly does weird things to the head."
Giles, Buffy and the rest fixed Xander with a look that he couldn't quite establish the meaning of.
Willow spoke, "I wasn't going to mention it, but there is this strange hole in the flowerbed… no person though."
This story is a collaboration between MK and Isoner. Rated PG-13, for now.
Sight Seeing
'For so much to be different,' Buffy thought, 'so much is the same as normal'. Willow, Tara, and Anya was researching with Giles to try and figure out what sort of Apocalypse was about to unfold, while Xander was sent on food runs, and she being a dutiful slayer was patrolling the local cemeteries and Demon haunts. All and all it was business as usual except that she was not in Sunnydale, the small town that seemed to be the epitome of the all American town, that just happened to be built on a hellmouth. Nope, here she was in a small town in England, with no hellmouth to be seen. This thought made her smirk as she thought to herself, 'Guess Sunnydale doesn't have the monopoly on apocalypses after all.'
It had all started about a week ago when Giles had received a telegram. It had been a from a friend or a fellow watcher, or as far as Buffy knew, both could have been the case. It had been simple and to the point, it asked him to bring the slayer. Giles was prepared to bring his young charge…except that Buffy had been adamant about bringing her support team. She could still remember telling Giles that the group could find out more information quicker than the stuffy tweed shirts in the watchers any day, besides she could probably use the back up of two witches, an ex-demon, and well Xander could always provide military knowledge, and had a knack of breaking up the tension that came about by intense research and the killing of the creatures that they fought. Things had just blossomed from there as Dawn had told their mom that she should get to go too, and her mom said it would be a good experience for Dawn to see England, and she needed a vacation herself. She still wasn't sure how they had managed not only to come along, but a nice hotel room downtown on top of it. Things had gotten even stranger when she had received a telegram from the love sick Spike telling her that he would be arriving soon.
Once they had actually arrived in this ideal small port town, they immediately discovered that Giles long lost buddy that had sent them the warning was now the newest resident of the local morgue, and that his house had been ransacked. Now the others were trying to make heads or tails out of what they could find of the mans possessions to figure out what he had been working on that had been dangerous enough to need their help. So while they were having that fun, Buffy was walking around town to speculate on other cosmic events, such as why all cemeteries looked the same after dark no matter where in the world they were located. At least the jetlag was working to her advantage.
She sensed an unnaturalness coming up behind her. She would never understand why vampires always fell for her 'innocent girl strolling through the graveyard' routine. She turned to face them trying for one of her trademark quips, and found that one was just not coming to her at the moment. "Oh forget it, its been a busy night and I just too tired." She spoke into the face of the lead vampire. Her high kick sent him sprawling and by the time the second vampire realized what had happened, Buffy's stake had hit home and he was crumpling to dust around it.
She turned to face the first vampire still lying on the ground and spoke to him, "This is the part where you look all shocked and amazed then say something all inane like 'die slayer'."
He didn't. Instead, he lunged at her growling. He didn't stand, he simply went from lying prone on the ground, to a full fledge flying at her throat. She barely dodged the attack by stepping back, and managed to block his next three blows with her arms. She winced thinking of the bruises she would have in the morning. Then she sensed another presence coming up behind her and knew that she had to end this one quickly. With one as powerful as this one she didn't want to be ganged up on. "You must be older than you look. It's been awhile since I have faced one as powerful as you. How old are you? 5?" She smiled when she realized that he was going to take the bait.
The onslaught paused as he pulled himself up and in a haughty tone glared down at her, "I'll have you know that I am over two thous…" Startled he looked down to find himself impaled on Buffy's stake. "Oh Shi…" was heard as he crumbled to dust.
Buffy didn't even turn, instead she relied entirely on instinct and rolled forward. Even as she did so, she could feel the air rush past from the missed blow across her back. She came up with a roundhouse kick that landed, knocking the newest vamp down. Not waiting for him to get up, she was on him in a heartbeat, her stake landing, turning him to dust as well.
Standing she realized that she was breathing heavily. How long had it been since she had had that kind of workout, and still she knew that she wasn't done. There was one more out there, she could sense it, and this was a powerful one too. All of her extra training with Giles was paying off in the advance-warning department of her slaying abilities, still, she couldn't pinpoint where it was. Shaking her head to clear it she continued on.
A little farther on Buffy found something that she hoped that she wouldn't. The vamps last meal, a family. A man, woman and daughter, definitely dead, with the tale tell puncture marks on their necks. She checked them carefully and found that they wouldn't be coming back changed.
As she was standing from looking over the bodies she found that the fourth vampire was now close, very close. Relying on her instinct once more she brought her stake up in time to block the blow. The sword nearly cleaved the wooden stake in half, and probably would have if the blow hadn't been halted by the attacker.
"You're no vampire." The man said.
Buffy gave the man a once over. Pale complexion, fangs, fashion sense twenty years out of date at least. "No, but you are." She said as she plunged the mostly broken stake into his chest.
The man threw his head back and howled, his fangs elongating in his mouth. Buffy had never heard such a cry of anguish and pain before, then she felt something hot and wet hit her hand. Looking up she saw his shirt darkening with the color of blood. "Oh god." She stammered out, her mind quickly replaying a scene from her past, where Faith staked the Mayor's assistant. In that moment she knew the feeling that Faith had went through. Her mind babbling, horrified, 'not a vampire, human. I've killed a human.' Then the screaming stopped as he fell to the ground.
"Oh god. What do I do?" Scooping the man up she started to carry the man to Giles.
Xander walked into the house where they were doing the research and set down the food he had picked up from the pub down the street. Pulling out the sacks he set them down and looked at the group. "Here I have brought what they tried to tell me was food, for the much needed research sustenance. I hope fish and chips are alright with everyone." Seeing there nods of agreement he sat down and began doling out the food to everyone. "Well gang what have we found out?"
"Not much of anything really." Willow answered. She looked up from the book she was reading and idly reached up her hand to softly stroke Tara's blonde hair.
"Mr. Giles, do you know anything about this Barbarroy?" Tara softly spoke.
"Barber Roy. Yeah he works down at barber shop." Xander quipped taking a bite of french-fry. "Guh. Is their any salt. That has got to be the blandest french-fry I have ever tasted.
"Yes Xander, I am quite sure everyone here knows of your dislike of English food. Now what were you saying Tara." Giles gave Xander a look.
Tara gingerly picked up a piece of paper that was splattered in blood and held it out for the watcher to see. "There was a mention of a demon called Barbarroy in his journal, then I came across this piece of paper. It is the only thing written on it, so I thought it might mean something to you."
Giles noticed the blonde witch trying to hold the paper without touching any of the bloodstains. He walked around the table to take the piece of paper out of her hands. Looking at it he saw that there was indeed only one word on the paper. "Barbarroy? I can't say that it rings any bells. Anyone else?" He looked around at the group of young people and noticed Anya had gone pale. "Anya, do you know anything about them?"
"I know enough to stay away from him." She answered.
Giles sighed as he asked, "Is there anything else you can add?"
"Barbarroy was something of a mercenary… Mercenaries and Vengeance Demons don't socialize much."
"Yes, be that as it may, we should probably get some rest, and begin bright and early tomorrow morning on research." Giles began when suddenly the door burst open. Whirling around he realized something was drastically wrong when he saw a panic stricken Buffy holding a man, who apparently had a stake through his heart.
The others stood, just looking at each other, and wondering what to do. Strangely enough it was Tara who stood up to take charge. "Giles could you go get me some warm water. Buffy put him on the couch, then go upstairs and find me some rags, towels, anything like that. Anya find me something to prop under his head, and Willow get our bag with our supplies in it." She then went over to the man on the couch once she saw that the others were moving to do her bidding. When Willow returned with their bag she took out the scissors, and cut his shirt off of him. Looking up it appeared that he was unconscious. When everyone had retuned she put the warm water down on the floor and put some herbs that were good for disinfecting and pain killing into the water, then with Buffy's help placed a pillow under his head. Cutting up the towel that Buffy had brought she put it in the pan of water, and then started wiping the blood off his chest, cleaning the wound as best she could, and held slight pressure around the stake.
"Giles, oh god, Giles, h-he was human." She paced around the couch, hovering between Giles and the wounded man. "I killed a human, like Faith. Giles." Buffy stuttered out as tears began coursing down her face.
"Bloody Hell!" Giles ran over to the man and began to check him over. Placing his hand on his neck he felt a faint pulse. "He's still alive. Call an ambulance." With the man's pale complexion, and slightly pronounced incisors Giles could see why his slayer had made the mistake, but it was a mistake a Slayer could not afford to make.
"No. No ambulance." The mans voice was raspy but strong and commanding. He continued, "Dig a shallow hole. Bury me. Leave my head uncovered."
"Wha…" Xander began.
"Do it." The man ordered in a flat tone taking time to look at everyone in the room.
They all looked at him and Giles still looking into the man's eyes spoke, "Xander, find a shovel and dig him a hole."
When Xander came back inside to say that he had the hole dug, he and Buffy picked him up gently and carried him out the door that Giles held open for them. Xander noticed that the man was tall, but thin as Buffy placed his head and upper body down into the hole making sure that his head had plenty of space to be outside of the hole when they placed the dirt over him. Xander then lay his feet and legs into the hole and began filling in the dirt over him as he requested. When the two had finished the task they looked up at Giles.
"Buffy. What happened?" Giles asked the slayer gently. She looked like she was about to jump out of her skin.
"I was patrolling the cemetery. I had killed three vampires, but I felt another presence. It felt, old, powerful. I had just found the family that the other vampires had finished feeding on when this guy comes up. I blocked his sword with my stake, and I remember thinking that it should have cut through the stake. Then he looked at me and said that I wasn't a vampire. I looked at him, and he was pale, and he had these fangs, besides did you see what he is wearing, I mean come on, he looks like an 70's fashion victim." Buffy babbled out. "I didn't realize that he was human. He looked like a vampire, I mean he had fangs. Or at least I thought he did." Buffy looked down at her feet looking guilty.
Giles patted Buffy on the shoulder and then spoke, "We can talk more about this in the morning. It is getting late and we have had a long day, so let's just call it a night and get some sleep."
"Ok, but I don't get dead guy room." Buffy nodded and leaned into Giles for a moment taking some comfort in Giles presence as they walked back into the house.
"Yes, well I was going to sleep in there, and give Willow, Tara, and you the other bedroom, and put Xander and Anya on the couch." Giles started to explain when he was interrupted by Anya.
"But I wanted a bed to play shiver me timbers with Xander." Anya huffed, "and why did you bury that guy anyway?
Xander awoke to the sounds of Giles and the others fixing breakfast in the next room. Once again, Anya had managed to keep him awake far longer than he had planned. It had certainly been enjoyable.
He yawned and stretched, putting his feet on the cold floor. Speaking to whoever bothered listening, "You know I had the strangest dream. I dreamt that we buried some guy alive in the flowerbed. Sleeping in dead guy's homes certainly does weird things to the head."
Giles, Buffy and the rest fixed Xander with a look that he couldn't quite establish the meaning of.
Willow spoke, "I wasn't going to mention it, but there is this strange hole in the flowerbed… no person though."