Chapter 4: One Step Forwards…

A/N (Here we go! All Internal Assessments OVER, thank Goddess, so now I can actually write! Thank you again to Kim for reviewing… I agree. Joyce really probably should have seen a specialist. sigh. Anyway, here's the next chapter. Enjoy, and please tell me what you think. :) I'd love to hear any feed back. )

"I can't believe I'm actually enjoying history these days," Daniel marveled. "What's up with that?"

"This Miss. Maldrow must be good," Buffy commented dryly as the Magic Box bell tinkered happily above them. Dawn had one day likened it to Daniel. That little comment had earned her a full-grade tickling. "I mean, I know everything about her in the space of a fifteen minute walk."

"She's cool," Dawn shrugged. "She's the first Sunnydale Junior High teacher who is interesting. That's an instant cool."

"She's probably a demon," Anya commented brightly as she overheard their conversation.

The three stared at her, horrified. "Don't say that!"

Daniel groaned and then whacked his forehead. "We're doomed."

They all raised an eyebrow at that. "I thought you were optimistic," Giles remarked.

"I'm being optimistic," Daniel grinned back. "We're all doomed!"

Buffy frowned as, at his words, the glowing sphere in her pocket physically pulsed. She surveyed the Scoobies sprawled or standing. "Hang on a sec, that reminds me. I have a little Scooby-centric deal."

She brought it out and handed it to Giles. "I put this before the group. What the hell is it?"

"It appears to be paranormal in origin," Giles studied it in awe, weighing it in his hands. Willow looked up from the table.

"How can you tell?"

"Well, it's so shiny…"

Dawn, Daniel, Xander, and funnily enough, Tara simultaneously snickered.

"Found it on patrol," Buffy told them. "This watchman guy gave it to me and Spike. Does anyone have a clue?"

Cassandra swallowed

"Maybe you should go back to where the watchman guy was," Willow suggested. "There might be more."

Cassandra swallowed again.

"That's a good idea, Willow," Buffy nodded. "I'll check it out with Spike tonight."

"Whatever it is," Tara spoke up. "It feels v-very powerful."

Cassandra gulped.

"Oh?" Giles handed the orb over to Tara who looked surprised. He smiled at that. "Willow has informed us that your empathic ability for sensing objects and people is very powerful," he told her. "What do you think?"

Tara's eyes went blank for a few seconds, and then she was back. A worried line jagged its way through her forehead. "That's strange… I can't get anything except for its p-power. But… it f-feels good."

"Good, you say?" Giles took the orb back again. "Well, I don't…"

Cassandra snapped.

"It's the Dagon Sphere," she said hoarsely.

Silence greeted her for a few seconds, and then everyone began talking. She felt like she was in a bubble of pain. The headache was back, and throbbing away merrily.

"Huh?" Buffy stared.

"Dagon Sphere?" Daniel echoed.

"Funny name," Xander muttered.

"What?" Willow asked.

"Wait, how..?" Dawn frowned.

"The Dagon sphere?" Giles muttered.

"The Dagon sphere?" Anya repeated, searching her extensive memory.

"The Dagon sphere?" Tara murmured.

"How do you know this?" they all said simultaneously.

She closed her eyes and tried to breathe. Daniel saw the blood drain out of her face and quickly was by her side, shaking her shoulder. "Cass? Cass!"

She snapped back. "I'm okay," she looked into his worried eyes, finding comfort there for a second before turning back to face the barrage of questions.

"Remember?" she hesitated. "I… I get feelings about things. It was how I felt Dracula coming and how I knew Buffy and Faith had switched."

There was a universal "Huh?"

Oh great. There's probably some memory thing attached to this.

"I'm a seer," she explained. "Look up 'Dagon's Sphere'. Just trust me."

"But…" Giles tried.

For once, it was straightforward Anya. She went right to the correct book, flipped it open, and peered through the pages.

"This?"

8 8 8

Dawn and Buffy walked back home, shaky.

"I can't believe that… I didn't remember," Dawn wondered.

"I know," Buffy answered, unlocking the door. "I can't believe it either."

"It was so big, but I guess it got lost in the whole Faith-Riley thing…"

Buffy was about to let the pain of that remembered memory wound her when a soft moan came from the living room. "Shh! Mum?"

Another groan. Buffy and Dawn rushed in to her side. Joyce's face was a picture of pain as she moved fitfully on the couch.

"Mum!" Buffy cried.

"What's wrong?" demanded Dawn hysterically.

"It's just my head…" Joyce said weakly as she tried to sit up. By the deepened lines on her face, she had been there for a while.

Buffy's mouth thinned. "I'm taking you to the doctor."

"No, sweetheart. I'm fine," Joyce shook her head and winced.

"We don't know that! We don't know anything. We're going."

"I just need my prescription," Joyce looked pleadingly up at her eldest. "Please?"

Buffy picked up the slip and stood, in Slayer-mode. "Hospital pharmacy open?"

"Mmm-hmm."

Determination coloured her voice. "Ten minutes."

8 8 8

The technician handed me the bottle of pills, and I turned to leave, examining the bottle as I went. I'd get this back to Mum as quickly as possible. The memory of her face in pain made me shudder.

God, I was so scared.

"Hey! It's Buffy, isn't it?"

I spun around and looked at the intern calling my name, confused.

"I'm Ben... but you can call me man-nurse. Everybody else here does."

Suddenly, the patient he was wheeling sat up, struggling hard in an attempt to get off the gurney. My eyes widened as I recognized him.

"You're… you're the night watchman!"

"I don't belong here! I have important instructions. Fascists!"

I watched in shock as Ben pushed him back down while the orderlies fastened his restraints. "Now you're hurting the nice orderly who's here to help you."

He turned to the nurse. "I need nine cc's of Phenobarbital in this guy imme…"

I finally got over my shock and stepped up to help, pinning his shoulder to the gurney with as much firm gentleness as I could afford. I felt Ben's eyes looking at me.

"Uh… or not. Now let's strap him," he looked down at the night watchman. "For your own good, I promise."

As the watchman struggled, he turned to me. "You know, not to be rampantly sexist in the workplace, but you've got some serious muscles for a girl."

I was stuck and suddenly I regretted helping. They could have done very well without me, with the sedative-pumpy thingies. "I… um…"

"Radioactive spider bite?"

I forced a laugh. "How'd you guess?"

"I'm a doctor," he smiled, before grimacing. "Well, almost."

I was about to reply when the night watchman seized my arm. I almost jumped, but I kept my hold down. But then I loosened it as I saw what he was staring at.

Mum's medicine bottle.

"Doesn't even help! Doesn't make a damn bit of difference!"

"I've met this guy…" I told Ben, beginning to get a tingling feeling at the back of my neck that told me something was seriously wrong. "He's a security guard. He's not crazy."

I could see the disbelief in his eyes. "If you say so..."

The watchman ignored both of us as the orderlies continued strapping him down. "They're coming at you!" he howled. "Don't think you're above it, missy. They come through the family! They get to your family!

That hit too close to home. I let go of him, stunned. "My… my family? What do you mean?"

The medicine bottle fell to the floor. They wheeled him away. I stared after him as he struggled against his bonds. Ben picked up the bottle and handed it back to me.

"I'm real sorry about that. Here. For your mom?"

"Yeah…" I replied, still dazed, my Buffy-mind working overload. "Thanks."

"She's not feeling better?" he asked sympathetically.

As everything fell into place, my eyes narrowed. "Not yet but she will be. I'm starting to figure out what's wrong."

I ran, leaving him behind. I almost threw the bottle of pills at Daniel who'd opened the door, presumably the two had come over since I was gone, but I wasn't thinking of that. I had to get to the Magic Box.

8 8 8

"Giles! Giles!"

The Watcher glanced up, startled as his Slayer ran into the Magic Box.

"Buffy?"

Her eyes were strength. "Giles, I have an idea what's making my mom sick."

"Have you spoken with her doctors?" Giles asked.

"They won't find anything. What's hurting her… it's supernatural," she picked up the Dagon Sphere. "The night watchman who found this thing? He went crazy. Overnight."

Willow, Giles, and Anya, the ones closest to the orb, stood alarmed. "But it said that it "brought protection against the one who can not be named," Anya protested.

"I don't think it's that," Buffy shook her head. "It won't hurt us. I had it on me all night. But this guy, he saw things... he said things."

"Such as?" Giles asked mildly.

"They'll come at me through my family," Buffy repeated with a tone of finality.

"Who will?" Xander asked sharply.

"I don't know... yet. But whatever touched this guy, it made him see through what the rest of us are seeing. He knew someone's hurting my mum and they're trying to get to me."

"It's possible," Tara offered. "There are m-magicks that can work to divine loved ones a-and then hit at them."

"But still... the ramblings of a madman aren't much to go on," Giles noted.

"Yeah, but it's a start," Buffy said. "We need to find out who's making my mom sick and how."

"Then what?" Willow asked.

Buffy's eyes turned hard. "Then I hunt them... find them... and kill them."

8 8 8

I can't find my way out.

Can you help me?

I'm lost. Tumbling, falling.

Crying, like a little child.

I can't find my way out anymore…

I've regressed.

In an effort to keep the remainder of myself alive, part of me spends its time as a child again. This other part, me, the part speaking now… I'm still furiously digging away at the walls, bleeding.

I can only control for about a day at one go now. I used to be able to go for at least a week. I'm so afraid. I'm so afraid.

It's been half a year. I know that, because last time I managed to break through, it was about a month or so after Christmas.

Oh Goddess… I'm so scared.