Chapter Thirteen
Buffy drove the axe hard down into the spider's face. It hissed and spat, shivering sideways before succumbing. No matter how fast she killed them, Buffy thought, another one emerged from an alley or charged around the street corner. Eventually, she would run out of stamina, or luck, and one would sting her, or eviscerate her. And come midnight-
Her thoughts were cut short by the whump-whump of helicopter rotors. She turned to see a black chopper emerge from the black of the night. She frowned and glanced at her watch. Five to eleven. Suddenly a bright light from the side of landing gear lit her up and she blinked rapidly.
The relatively small craft set down on the darkened street near an overturned police car. The police had given up hours ago, waiting for military reinforcements. Quitters. Buffy dashed over a tangle of legs to the side of the chopper. Anya was close behind.
"You call for a ride?" a voice shouted from inside, trying to overpower the roar of the engine. Buffy took the hand that was offered to her jumped inside, her eyes blinking away the after-image of the search light and focusing on the man before her.
"Angel?" She frowned in surprise and a little suspicion.
The vampire cocked his head in a little shrug. "Captain America sends his compliments, and his chopper, but I think you'll need more than that to find Loki."
She squeezed the hand she still held firmly and drew him closer to be sure she was heard over the whipping rotors. Her eyes were hard and her tone was stern. "Are you here to help me or slow me down?" She could see in his eyes he was hurt - hell, so was she, to have to talk to him like this. But how could she trust him? He who had handed her sister over? How could she trust anyone?
"I'm here to help," Angel said just as sincerely, his eyes locked with hers as the chopper rose from the ground. "We will find her."
"That's their mode of transportation?" Anya said in disappointment, indicating with her scythe the small vehicle just starting to lift off. "I've seen decomposition that's faster than that." She sighed. "I might as well just go get her myself!" Anya huffed and disappeared, utilizing her own specialized demonic teleportation ability.
Xander lifted his sword from the spider corpse and glanced over at Giles. "She doesn't need to know where she's going?"
Giles removed his own weapon with a furious tug. "Apparently not."
"Filed under 'Things that would have been helpful to know earlier,'" Xander shook his head.
The helicopter slid away into the night, the reverberating hum of the engine fading fast as it sped towards the airport.
Anya fizzled back into reality in a dark stone room whose only light was a single slit window. Her first thought was that she hadn't in fact gone anywhere. She stood near a spider as she had near the disappointingly mediocre chopper. The second thought was that Dawn was shouting something at her.
Anya turned to see that the spider she had dismissed was in fact quite alive, and quite attacking. She jumped to one side, avoiding the mandibles, bringing her scythe point down into one of its larger eyes.
It gave the expected hiss, and wrapped a hairy leg around her, bringing her uncomfortably close to its jaws. "Son of a bitch!" She shouted quite loudly.
Dawn glanced nervously over her shoulder and added in a good approximation of Anya's voice: "Damn it! This is impossible!" She hoped neither Loki nor the monk would check in on her.
Loki frowned and glanced back at the wooden door. Dawn's frustration was evident. He shook his head, hearing nothing further, and continued with the monk.
"There are many kinds of bravery," he was saying. "In this case, I obviously don't expect the girl to take on the spider single handedly. The courage that's being tested is the courage to stand up to the test." The monk was nodding. "When she comes back out without the stone, she will have to say to me that she was unable to get it. The test requires her to challenge my own faith in her abilities. She must come to the conclusion that the test is unfair, and be brave enough to confront me about it."
"How is failure achieved in this instance?" The monk asked, nearly no emotion heard in his voice.
"The longer it takes her to realize she cannot win, the harder it will be to confront me about it." There was nothing but logic in Loki's voice. "If she waits too long, she will have accepted that she has failed and will therefore have done so. She will have forfeited the inner strength required to possess a soul, in her mind. Her quest will be over."
Anya, meanwhile, had hooked the scythe under the creature's chin and had ruptured its circulatory system. A black ooze flowed out across the floor. The spider screamed a weak, but very high pitch scream and released her, launching itself back against the far wall and curling up into a protective ball of legs and eyes.
Anya stumbled back, her heel catching on something on the uneven stone floor, nearly causing her to fall.
Dawn rushed down the stairs and took Anya by the arm, at the same time snatching the small object the vengeance demon had nearly tripped over. When they were both safely back atop the staircase, Dawn clutching the small leather pouch and Anya clutching her trusty weapon of pain, Dawn turned on Anya.
"What are you doing here?" There was an obvious amount of anger in her voice.
"I don't know," Anya answered bluntly, "I had intended to appear in the front hall."
"I don't want help," she snapped. "I have to do this myself."
Anya glanced down at the spider. "Do what? Be eaten?"
"Get this," Dawn held out the stone she had removed from the pouch.
"I don't think you ever would have gotten it," Anya said skeptically. "Not in this life anyway. Large spiders seem to think you taste good."
"Can you leave now?" Dawn asked irritated, a slight amount of urgency in her voice as she glanced over her shoulder at the closed door.
"But we have new information-" Anya began.
"I don't care!" Dawn hissed, trying to keep her voice low. "Just get out. I don't want or need protection. Not here, not now." There was a pause. "Go!" Dawn ordered.
Anya threw up her hands. "Fine!" She turned away from Dawn, crossing her arms. "Ingrateful little runaway-" and she vanished again from the dungeon.
Dawn sighed in relief, clutching the pouch tightly. She took a breath, waited another few heartbeats, then pushed the door open, the light of the corridor flooding the room and evoking a small whine from the injured spider.
Dawn strode out into the hall, presenting the sphere before her. She noted the stifled expressions of awe on the faces of both the monk and Loki. "Did I pass?" She asked, a little worry entering her mind. Why were they so shocked?
Loki exchanged a long stare with the monk, then turned back to Dawn, placing a hand on her shoulder, then turning her slightly to examine her garb, to see if she had been wounded. "Uh, yes, you have passed the Third Test," he said at last. "Now, uh, you may return to your room to rest until the final test tonight."
Dawn nodded, tucking the stone back into the pouch. She followed the same route back to her room that she remembered, the monk remaining with Loki.
As soon as she was gone, Loki and the monk rushed to the door, pulling it open, their eyes widening at the scene below. The scene was only improved by the slight moan of the spider as the light from the corridor spread across its curled up body. The pool of black ooze was ever-widening.
Loki looked from the monk to the spider to back down the hall in the direction Dawn had headed, then looked back to the monk. He shook his head in amazement.
"That's some kind of bravery," he said. "Though I wouldn't have thought I could possibly have underestimated her."
"She is unpredictable," the monk replied. "More so than we expected."
Loki raised an eyebrow at this paradox, but then he smiled as it seemed to please him. "More unpredictable than expected, I like that."
Anya reappeared on the street, just in time to duck another spider charge, bringing her scythe to its throat the same way she had the last one. "-unaway," she finished.
Xander grabbed her by the forearm. "We need to have a talk about relevant information you need to contribute."
"But the spiders," Anya protested.
"The fun can wait," he snapped, and pulled her into the Magic Box.
Buffy and Angel spent most of the plane ride in silence. Buffy, still trying to stoke the anger she felt for Angel for just general incompetence with regards to his associates and especially her sister's safety, while Angel was harboring some slight resentment at being the scapegoat for this entire fiasco. He maintained that there had been nothing in any ancient text about Loki, and therefore he had been deemed safe.
They landed in Chamdo, Tibet, without incident, at nearly eleven in the morning local time. The local airport service charged a hefty sum to safely unload the chopper from the cargo hold, irking Angel just a little bit more as he pulled out his credit card. Buffy merely grinned.
Her grin soon disappeared, however, as the two of them and their pilot began flying passes over the snowy peaks of the Himalayas, the dizzying drops and mind-bending scales making her Slayer stomach a little queasy.
It was not until the sun was turning the sky red that they approached what looked like a Buddhist lamasery. There was a broad stone terrace at the bottom of an insanely high array of steps, leading up to the narrow building set into the mountain's overhang.
"There's no other place to land," the pilot shouted over his radio to Angel. The sky was already a dark blue, the steps looking more like a dark stone ramp without the contrast of the sun's rays.
"Alright, right here then," Angel nodded.
It was not until they had actually set down that the scale of the terrace and steps was cemented in Buffy's mind. There had to be at least two thousand steps.
"I hate Buddhism," she muttered and leapt from the chopper, racing up the steps as fast as her Slayer's legs would carry her.
Angel sprinted after.
Dawn had just gotten to sleep when the polite knock came at her door. She sat up and then stood as the monk entered, bowing low and ushering her out.
Dawn took a step, then turned and grabbed the leather pouch from her sleeping mat. She hurried out after the monk as he took her down the corridor again.
The chanting of the other monks was as loud as before, but this time it was getting stronger the closer they got to the main hall. Dawn stopped short of entering it at the sight of the fifty sitting monks all droning the one long syllable. The hum resonated off the inside of the stone walls, making her jaw chatter.
The monk led her through the rows of cross-legged cantors to the front of the room, by a set of wooden double doors, which was presumably the exit. There was now a mat under the rough table there, and the instant she set foot on it, the tone of the chanting rose. Dawn worked her jaw, as the tone of the chanting seemed to penetrate past her ears into her skull.
Loki turned. He stood behind the table, wearing his standard outfit, with a tasseled rope draped around his neck, hanging from his shoulders. The rope was gold in color, and of course it clashed with everything else he wore. It did, however, match nearly perfectly with the golden blond of his hair.
"Dawn Summers," he began, his voice at a pitch such that he did not have to raise his voice above the chanting to be heard. "You have proven to yourself all that you can be." He did not look her in the eyes, but focused, very ceremonially, on some point at the back of the room. He held out his hand to her.
She retrieved the small glass sphere and placed it in his palm, wondering what on Earth the Fourth Test could be. She surreptitiously leaned forward to see what was in the urn, but at that instant, the tone of the droning increased again, all as one. Dawn quickly aborted her reconnaissance and looked around her, to see what might be going on.
Loki held the ball above his head, then joined in the droning of the monks. He slowly brought the small glass ball down to the urn and dropped it in. There was a plunk and then the sound of glass hitting the bottom of the urn. Dawn knew immediately the urn was filled with water.
"Place your hand in the water," Loki advised, "and your soul will be yours."
There was a moment of hesitation. What happened to the Fourth Test, she was about to ask, but the stern look in her guide's eyes told her she had better not. It must have been something to do with her having mysteriously killed the spider. Did he no longer trust her?
Dawn reached forward, bringing her hand over the mouth of the urn. She felt an electric hum move up her arm to the elbow. It was warm and almost pleasant. But she knew where she had felt it before. If she had looked, she would have seen a slight crackling green jumping between her fingers as she reached over the urn. This did not bother her, however, as she did not know anything about the soul incarnation process anyway.
It seemed fitting, Dawn thought, that the companion she had harbored like a hitchhiker, but that for so long had defined her existence, was here to see her completed. Perhaps it would leave her, returning to whatever state it had occupied before she had been created...
Anything to make me normal, the thought sliced across her thoughts as if it had been waiting this whole week to make itself known. Was that why she was doing this? To be like the others? For the peace of mind of knowing she would join Buffy and Joyce when the time came? That was it. To get rid of the loneliness. To quit wandering through the woods alone and step onto the path with everyone else. Though maybe there was no path. Maybe it was just a horizon.
Maybe everyone would understand her after this. Maybe, she thought again, she would understand the others a little better. Maybe, just maybe, it would all make a little more sense.
It certainly seemed to in Spike's case. And Angel-
The double doors burst in and Angel and Buffy charged through, sword and crossbow in hand.
Dammit, Dawn cursed in her mind. The worst possible time.
"Dawn, don't touch that!" Buffy shouted over the humming of the monks, which had reached a height of urgency in tone.
"Welcome, Buffy Summers," Loki turned and smiled. "You will not need those," he indicated their raised weapons. "All who come here are peaceful. We will not resist you."
"Good, then the three of us will be going," Buffy started forward, but stopped at Loki's raised hand.
"The choice remains Dawn's," he said simply. The three of then turned to look at Dawn, whose hand was already into the mouth of the urn, her electrically humming hand near the water's surface.
"Dawn," Buffy said slowly and deliberately. "Take your hand out of the jar."
Loki simply blinked at Dawn, waiting to see how she would react. "Your soul is ready for you," he whispered.
"Dawnie," Buffy used her sister's childhood name, one which engendered trust. "Listen to me. This man is not who he says he is."
"I am your guide," Loki responded.
Dawn hesitated, her hand almost vibrating with the hum of the Key and the droning of the chant.
"His name," Angel began, "is Logan Kilpatrick. He murdered his family and friends. His wife and daughter."
"That is what the police concluded," Loki answered. "They didn't have the Werlech demon's finger prints." He kept his distance from the table, but offered his hands in peace. "Dawn, I told you my story. I told you what happened. They're not trying to hurt you, but they're confused. They've been reading incorrect information."
"Dawn," Buffy pleaded. "The spider was his. He conjured it. He's made others. They've killed dozens. There are half a dozen of them running around Sunnydale right now."
"All designed to bring you to this moment," Loki said calmly. His words made so much sense in Dawn's mind. "You understand," it was a statement. Loki raised an eyebrow. "This is the Fourth Test. A test of faith."
Dawn's hand paused as she began to withdraw it from the urn. Her fingers were now visibly crackling with green energy, sending warmth up to her shoulder.
"Do you believe," Loki went on, "in your heart of hearts that this is right for you? Do you believe you deserve it?"
"It's not about that," Buffy argued, keeping her voice sensible in the face of Logan's infuriatingly logical note. "This has nothing to do with your soul," she said desperately. "He's your creator," she immediately regretted saying that.
Dawn's brow furrowed. She looked quickly to Loki, betrayal on her face.
"It's true," he said slowly, a distant look of regret on his face. "I am your... father, I suppose. I created you to be all that you could be. You have never disappointed me. I saw, however, that I had neglected to give you something very, very special."
Dawn's eyes were filled with tears. She was listening to Loki, to his calm and reasonable voice, but she was looking at her sister. Her hand was nearly out of the urn.
"Now you have a chance; one chance to reclaim that which by rights is yours," Loki said, passionately closing his fist. "If you want it."
Dawn dropped her gaze, feeling the sting of a tear rolling down her cheek. She had not been able to cry since the withdrawal, seeming now like aeons ago. She looked up to Loki, the man who had stayed with her through her pain.
"I want it," she said and dove her hand back into the urn.
"Wait," Buffy cried, "if you touch that water," she took a desperate step forward, now she was as near the table as Logan, "if you touch it," she said again, "I'll lose you forever." Tears were building up in her own eyes as she reached out her hands to her sister.
Dawn stopped, the inside of the jug radiating the beautiful green light of her hand. It was just millimeters above the surface of the fluid.
"It will erase you," Buffy said hoarsely. "Take you away, as if you never were," a tear fell loose from her lash and landed on her blouse. "He wants the Key, Dawn," she whispered. "He wants to use it to find his own soul."
Dawn's wet eyes shifted to Loki, an honest look of concern on her face.
Loki had for once pulled his eyes off of the likeness of his daughter and focused them now squarely on the Slayer beside him. He shook his head once, almost as in disbelief. "Don't you think I wouldn't kill a thousand innocents if it meant I could see Hanna again?" He spoke to Buffy, not Dawn. "Don't you think I haven't tried?" There were tears building in his own eyes now, as he showed more emotion than he had ever before.
Dawn looked down from his face to her hand in the urn, the energy crackling between her fingers as the Key prepared for what was to come next.
"I've been preparing for this moment, planning it down to its last second for decades. I've given Dawn to you," he said bitterly, "and you've given her a life of neglect and sorrow. Now I've taken her back, and given her everything she needs to make the decision that's right for her." He turned back to Dawn. "If you want everything that's been driving you crazy for the last two years of your life to make sense, to come together in your heart, then you know what you have to do." He took a step forward himself. "If you want to know, really know that when your time comes, at the end of a long life, you'll be in that place, with your mother and sister, and everyone you've ever loved: Then you know what you have to do." He continued on, regardless of the tear which rolled down his cheek. "If you want to have what I'll never have, what my daughter never had; the peace of spirit that comes with just knowing," he brought his clenched fist to his heart, "then you know what you have to do."
Dawn blinked away the sting as more tears wet her face. She looked back to Buffy.
Buffy wore the expression of deepest sorrow. One that Dawn had only seen once. Dawn had not been present when her sister had discovered Joyce, but she had been present when Joyce had nearly been brought back to life. She had been present and had seen that look. Buffy's face was stained with as many tears as it had been then, as her sister's was now. Buffy hugged her arms across her chest and whispered, almost inaudibly through the chant of the monks, "I don't want to lose you."
Dawn's hand rested above the water, the moment in her mind stretching out into infinity. The crackle of the energy across her hand, between her knuckles. The unending, unchanging hum of the combined voice of the monks. The sting of the tears as they dried on her cheeks.
Her eyes moved up one last time from the mouth of the urn, settling between her sister and her guide. A monk stood to either side of Angel, making certain he made no false moves, considering his armament. Her eyes moved to the face of the one. Her heart stopped. Charlie. Her hand tensed, her decision made.
The End