The Sacrifices
Epilogue: Dreams
Things were simple underground. Happiness was a jewel cluster. The way it warmed the beast from the inside was the epitome of satisfaction. The upper world was a cold place. The beast only went there when compelled by their rituals - those little worms that mocked it with their cloying supplications. This time they were pleasantly dead. But the offering was in its stomach. It would digest it slowly over decades, drawing strength and warmth from it until the next time. Maybe it would quiet the gnawing of that creature's flesh in its stomach, the one that wouldn't be digested so it irritated its insides. But for now it was happy as it burrowed, keeping its many heads close together, punching its way down into the warm places of the earth.
Harmony had broken a window of a greeting card store and taken a journal with unicorns on the cover. She had ripped off one of those pens attached by a chain to the cash register. She got out of there with the alarm blaring, and the cops pulling up. She got on the bus without paying by showing the driver her vamp face. He drove really funny for a while. Harmony had to yell at him to keep it steady. He was ruining her penmanship. She made a list in the journal.
"-Do learn how to hotwire a car. Buses are for losers.
-Don't try new things.
-Even if they involve jewels.
-Even if they are really big jewels.
-Do put more structure in your life.
-Look into joining another cult. Or major corporation.
-Spike sucks worse than ever.
-Maybe give him one more chance. But that's it.
-Never ever ever come back to Sunnydale, ever!
She underlined that one three times. Then her pen ran out of ink.
Buffy thought she saw the old man. His face appeared through the fogged mirror in the bathroom. And through the window downstairs, standing under a tree in her yard. Then he was behind her in the kitchen.
"You have something of mine," he said in a harsh whisper.
Buffy started to turn, but then she realized she could see him better if she didn't try to look right at him. His face looked hard and pale. His eyes were a sharp, cold blue. They mocked her. She knew him.
"Who'll burn for you now?" he asked her in a voice that was indistinct, like a rush of air by her ear.
She was on hold with the school. As she kept her eyes forward, he came close to her side. She turned, and he faded again as if he was made out of nothing. She kept staring and he dissolved. Buffy didn't think she would have to look at him again.
Xander stared at Spike, as he sipped his coffee. Xander was tired, and if he let his eyes cross, it seemed that Spike moved. Maybe he shouldn't let his eyes cross, or they might get stuck that way.
Xander had glimpsed Buffy moving around in the kitchen. Dawn and Willow had gone to bed. Willow had been mumbling about emailing the webmaster to update the Michila entry.
"Someone could get hurt," she said as she yawned her way up the stairs.
Xander heard Buffy on the kitchen phone letting the school know that she and Dawn weren't coming in. Her voice had a flat sound, but Xander was glad she was there. Staring at Spike was creepy. It was why Xander wasn't going to work yet - he hated to leave Buffy alone with him, with it. He sighed. He went over to the kitchen and set his coffee cup down by the sink.
Xander offered Buffy his help to move Spike again, but she said she didn't need it. She smiled at him, and she looked strangely calm and pretty. Not like someone who had stayed awake all night, and now had a vegetative vampire to deal with. Xander had changed and cleaned up. And if the side of the toaster was to be believed, he looked presentable.
"Everyone is playing hooky except you. You sure you don't want to join the slumber party?" Buffy asked.
The slumber party idea tempted him for a second. But then Xander remembered who else was invited. He looked back toward the living room and refused.
"No operating heavy machinery, right?" Buffy warned him as he got ready to leave.
Xander nodded, and he was out the door. It was a nice, sunny day. The kind of day that says everything is right with the world, demons aren't real. Only people going to work, kids going to school, someone setting their garbage out on the wrong day. Xander got into his car and drove off as Buffy stood in the doorway.
Buffy stood in the doorway at the back of the house. Xander had loaded up on coffee and gone to work. Willow and Dawn were napping. The sun was bright outside. The back yard looked extra green under its light. Perfect for a picnic. Maybe it was only a dream that the blanket lay on the grass covered with blood, dirt, and dust.
The end