5: First to fall.
The First Evil liked to play mind games. If you were a non-corporeal entity with time on your hands you probably would to. The First had been toying with the minds of lesser creatures since there had been lesser creatures to torment. And it had become very good at breaking them.
Other creatures would go for something more physical, but the right words could do far more damage.
The latest target on the Firsts list was Angel, the vampire with a soul. Given the chance he could become quite the force for good, and the First couldn't abide that now. Over the past day or so, the First had been forcing Angel to relive his past killings as Angelus and now, tonight, it was time to drive the metaphorical steak in.
It materialised in the living room of Angel's mansion, a bleak, empty space that reflected its owners dark mood. It had adopted the guise of Jenney Calendar, someone whose memory would affect Angel the worst. Angel himself was standing a few feet away, with his back to the First.
"Having trouble sleeping?" it asked with false sympathy.
"Hmmm...No not really, how about you?" replied Angel, who seemed rather...happy. Almost jovial.
The First was quite taken aback. Had it completely driven Angel insane with the visions alone?
"I still blame you y'know." continued the First, trying to regain its composure.
"Oh, I dought the real Jenny blames the real Angel. I don't think the dead care about vengeance. Their dead, why would they give a hoot?"
The First was about to counter this when something Angel had said struck a wrong cord. "The real Angel?"
'Angel' smirked at the First. "Caught that did you? Well done. Gold star for you!" He clapped. The he changed. There was a flash of darkness that momentarily consumed him. When it passed Angel was gone and in his place was someone else. Someone the First didn't know.
"Who are you?" it asked, more weary now.
"Call me Darkside." said the stranger.
"What are you. Why don't I know you. I'm the First I know everyone!"
Darkside's smirk grew slightly. "Evidently not. You know, I thought you'd be different to the others, but I was wrong. Your just like the rest, think you know all but you haven't got a clue." He took a few steps forward as he continued. "The biggest fish in the pond, but that still makes you just a fish in a pond."
"Where's the real Angel?" asked the First.
"Out cold. He won't wake up for hours. Leaving me plenty of time to kill you."
The First burst out laughing. "Kill me! Hahahah, oh that is priceless. I'm the First, I can't die. I'm the thing that darkness fears!"
Now it was Darkside's turn to laugh. "Darkness fears you...ha! Tell you what, let's ask it." He looked over the First's shoulder. "So boss. Are you afraid of this over inflated phantom?"
The First spun round to see who the boy was addressing. What it saw was a man wearing a brown cloak, at least it assumed it was a man. It couldn't see the man's face under the hood but it could tell that the man was looking right at it. The First didn't sense any fear. If anything it felt...amusement.
The it felt something move behind it. The boy, it had forgotten about the boy. ' No need to worry.' It told itself ' I can't be hurt, these two are no threat.' Then the pain hit.
While the First had its back turned, Darkside had readied his sword and lashed out at the First in an upwards diagonal blow. The blade cut into the First's incorporeal form and sent it spinning through the air. It crashed into a wall and fell to the ground.
"How?" It grunted "H-how...can you?"
"Darkness enhanced blade." replied Darkside as he closed in. The First looked around desperately around for a moment then it disappeared. "No! Get back here you chicken!" Yelled Darkside, slashing at the place where the First had been just moments ago. "Dam it!"
"RRRAAAGHHHH!" Darkside put his fist through the nearest wall. "Bloody hell! Ok, ok. The First is a coward. Now that it knows I can hurt it it'll stay far away."
Ansem just stood where he was. He didn't move or say anything, he just observed. "You know, you'd make a great ghost of Christmas Future." said Darkside. "Wait...Christmas. I forgot, it's Christmas here." He bolted for the door, breaking off a chunk of masonry from the wall as he went. "Gotta go!" then he was gone.
For a moment nothing happened, then a dark portal appeared to Ansem's left. A figure in a black hood walked out. "Xemnas." said Ansem, acknowledging his Nobodies arrival.
"I take it that he's your latest 'project'" said Xemnas "I assume he's proving useful."
"He has a great deal of power but the darkness is still consuming him. I dought he will last much longer."
"Shame, I thought he might make a possible vessel. "
"No. He doesn't have the heart for that. He never did."
With that the two vanished leaving and empty mansion.
After leaving the mansion, Darkside had gone to the highest spot he could find, which happened to be a small hill just outside of town. "It's just not Christmas without..." he aimed his right hand at the cloudy night sky. "Bliz-za!" A large ball of ice materialised in front of his palm and rocketed upwards, disappearing into the clouds. "Wait for it...wait for it..." sure enough, snow started to fall.
Darkside walked back to Sunnydale, enjoying the snowfall he'd created. Other people were walking in the streets to, some just admiring the snow, others running around, just having a good time. Two of these people he recognised.
"Buffy, Angel!" even from a distance he could make out Buffy's face changing to an 'oh god, not him' expression.
"Hi...Darkside. How've you...'bin. "
"Alright I guess. Haven't seen you or Faith in a while. Not fighting someone else on the side are you?"
"New friend?" asked Angel, meaning Darkside.
"Not exactly, Angel this is Darkside, my 'nemisis'."
"So he's an...enemy" said Angel, trying to work out where Darkside stood.
"More of a joke to be honest. He once said 'So swares Darkside'. Can you believe that?"
"I'm standing right here you know, I can hear every word your saying."Darkside looked up at the snow for a moment then back to Buffy. "Sorry I didn't get you anything for Christmas...but, um...mayby...later" he walked off.
"He's...interesting." said Angel, once he was sure Darkside was out of earshot.
"Try demented. He's persistent though, I'll give him that." Buffy watched Darkside as he continued walking. She hated to admit it but she was starting to get attached to the hyperactive idiot.
"Well, I better get home. Someone decided to break part of the mansion and know I've got to repair it. So...I'll see you later?" said Angel.
"Yeah...sure." said Buffy.
Days later, Buffy was felt like the world was back to normal. Well, normal by her standards anyway. She and Angel were together again, despite the fact that 'getting physical' was out of the question. Even Willow and Oz had mended the rift in their relationship. She was currently back on patrol, walking round the cemetery, waiting for vampire to show up. Things were going good.
"Hey honey!" And there was the catch.
"Oh, for the love of...Don't you have better things to do Darkside? Find a girlfriend? Homework? Something?"
"Yeah, well, I don't go to school and there...aren't really any girls that... I mean, Cordilia and her lot are way out of my league, Willow's with OZ and your gay."
"Wait what!" Buffy was so surprised she nearly dropped her steak. "Gay, what do you mean gay. I'm not gay!"
Darkside looked mildly surprised "You sure, 'cause your always hanging around with Willow, and then there's the body language whenever your around Faith."
"Body language? There's no body language! A-and Willows my best friend!" Then she noticed the smile that Darkside was trying to restrain. "You're just yanking my chain aren't you?"
"Maybe"
"Oh, you're going to pay for that."
Buffy marched up to Darkside, who was bracing himself for the first punch. Buffy hit him with everything she had. Nothing happened. No cries, no flying backwards. Nothing.
Darkside seemed more taken aback than she was. "Try again?" Buffy hit him again and once more, nothing happened. It was like all her strength was just gone. "Ok, either I've gotten unbelievably powerful over night or something is wrong with your powers."
"Oh god. What-what if their leaving. There's only supposed to be one slayer, what if its leaving me and going all into Faith." Buffy couldn't accept that her powers were leaving. Was she just going to be normal now? Spend her days boring people with her old war stories?
"Yeah, well, you don't know that for sure. Maybe some witch put a spell on you or something. You might want to ask Captain Tweed before jumping to conclusions."
Darkside's words reassured Buffy slightly. She resolved to go and talk to Giles in the morning.
"Hey, Buf." She looked up at Darkside. "You need someone to walk you home? This town ain't exactly safe at night."
Buffy was about to say no but Darkside did have a point. Sunnydale was nowhere near safe after dark and without her powers she was just as defenceless as everyone else. "Ok, fine." The two started walking together in the direction of Buffy's house. "If something nasty does show up while it's eating you I'll have a chance to run away."
The walk to Buffy's house was a quiet one, with Darkside looking around for any danger and Buffy wondering how on earth he'd made it this far in life.
"Here we are, safe and sound." Buffy was about to ask Darkside how he knew this was her house but then decided that maybe she was better off not knowing.
"Um, thanks...Darkside." She walked up to the front door, leaving Darkside behind. She was about to open the door when something she'd been wondering bubbled to the surface. "Why do you keep fighting me and Faith anyway. You know you're never going to win so why?"
Darkside smiled at her. "Maybe it's not about winning. And on that note, toodles."
Buffy watched him go for a moment before going inside. "What a weirdo."
Darkside kept walking. He didn't need to turn his head to know that Ansem had appeared beside him. "The watchers council is in Sunnydale. Time to take another piece off the board."
Blair heard a knock at the door. That should have been the first sign that something was wrong. No one was supposed to know they were there. But he'd just finished giving the vampire his pills and with all the adrenaline causing through his system, he wasn't thinking about little details like that. He opened to door before he could stop himself.
"Hi." said the boy who was standing outside. "Shame, I loved you in Enterprise."
Blair was about to tell him to leave, the sword came up. It just appeared out of nowhere. The first Blair knew about it it was sticking in his stomach. He looked at his killer for a moment before the sword was yanked out.
Blair fell back, dead. Hobson heard the commotion and realised what was happening. He waited for the intruder to enter the main sitting room, then he jumped out from behind a wall and fired a crossbow bolt at him.
The bolt slammed into Darkside's chest, making him stager a little. Hobson was convinced that it was over, then Darkside removed the bolt. "If that was all it took, I'd 'ave been dead a long time ago." He raised his hand and blasted Hobson with a dark bolt. Hobson was knock backwards, crashing into some furniture, then he vanished in as darkness consumed him.
There were only three of them left now. Darkside, the vampire Zachary Kralik and Quentin Travers.
"Pills?" asked Zachary, hopefully.
"Be silent, filth!" Darkside fired him with a lightning bolt. After a brief scream there was nothing left but ash. Quentin remained seated. He observed Darkside as he walked round and sat down in a chair opposite him.
"Hi" said Darkside. Travers didn't answer him. "You seem awfully calm for a man in your position."
"I don't know who you are or what you are but you have just declared war on the watchers council."
"Hahaha! Oh, there won't be a war. That implies that both sides have an equal chance of winning."
Travers smirked at him. "You don't know what you've done. Do you?"
"Nope, worse. I know exactly what I've done. But it's not what I've done, it's what I'm going to do that's really horrifying." Darkside gave Travers his best 'evil smirk' "You're a sham."
"Excuse me?" asked Travers, putting as much indignation as he could into his voice.
"You heard. All your crap about the slayer being a tool for the council, but without you the slayer is still the slayer. No matter what she will always have a purpose but what are you without her? Watchers with nothing to watch just milling around thumbing through dusty old books?" he picked up a book from a side table then slammed it down to make his point. "You need the slayer to validate your existence, but all she really needs you lot for is info. And if one of them ever figures that out she is going to slap you right back into your place." his expression changed from a smirk to one of sadness "Buffy's smart enough to work it out. But she'll never get the chance. Just one more thing she doesn't know I've taken away."
Travers was about to reply when he saw something stand up behind the boy's chair. Darkside followed his gaze and saw the neoshadow standing there.
"Ah. We have company." More heartless began appearing in the room, rising up from the floor or clinging to the roof. "They want to turn you into one of them you know. But I think a body will send a much clearer message."
"You really think killing me will make a difference?" asked Travers, defiantly.
"I think that, when the time comes, it'll draw attention away from where it aught to be." Darkside stood up and went to stand behind Travers' chair. Travers himself didn't move or try to run. He wasn't going to give this thing the satisfaction. Darkside rammed his sword through the back of the chair until the point was protruding from Travers' chest. As the leader of the watchers died, Darkside looked at the assembled Heartless. "Friends, Heartless, countryshadows, lend me your antenna."