To the Power Born: A Tale of the Slayers

Part 26: Along Came…

Of course, there were things happening that had nothing to do with Warren, Drusilla or Catherine Madison. They were our biggest problem, Team Slayer's biggest problem— but a long way from the only one.

But not a lot came to Bloomington-Normal, you know? I mean, sure, demons are evil, and some are stupid— but not all of them are stupid. The not-stupid ones tended to stay away from Bloomington-Normal, and the stupid ones became target practice and training aids for the newbies.

Still, sometimes things did happen around the house. Not often, no. But… well, there for a while, I thought seriously about refusing any training sessions involving the newbies. Seriously. First Warren shows up during one— then the other mess. I didn't stop attending newbie-sessions only because some good came of that second mess.

Nine days after I stopped being stupid and accepted the friendship of Ripley, the last Tuesday in July, I was out training with Daddy's advanced martial arts group— me, the French Slayer, Marie, Berachah from Israel, and one of the last of that year's newbies to have come in, an Alaskan girl named Samantha (her father was an aikido instructor, her mother taught American Go-ju— the girl had all sorts of scary skills), when the craziness started.

I was upside down and flying through the air (I'd gotten careless while sparring Samantha— bad karma, when your opponent is an accomplished aikidoka), when this flash of light went off at a place about halfway between our little group and the big group that Buffy was working with, some thirty or so yards off. Even as I fell (correctly, thanks to constant drills), the flash resolved itself into a circle of light about eight feet high, and as I rose, a girl or woman came tumbling out of it. All I noticed at first was her clothes, which were odd as hell.

She wore a skintight (or had been skintight, she was too skinny) and badly battered deep red bodysuit that should have clung— and except for the rips on it, it covered her from head to toe, excepting for her heavy, wavy brown hair and the top joint of each finger and thumb. Even her eyes were covered by reflective lenses. The thing looked to be one piece (if a rather badly tattered piece), and had some sort of design in an ivory-white over the chest and back— but I couldn't really take the time to puzzle it out, not right then.

The girl turned an awkward tumble into a controlled fall with no visible effort, and came out of that tumble to stand on her feet some thirty feet from that weird light with an ease that made me jealous— and I'm good with the tumbling, what with all the Capoeira. Her head moved right, then left, and she looked over her shoulder to both sides, then muttered, "Never a frying pan without a fire!" just loud enough to be heard before she shouted, "Everyone GET CLEAR! There's some VERY nasty—"

Something burst out of the light, paused for maybe a second, then locked on the strange girl and snarled at her even as Buffy started calling orders. Even as Buffy spoke, three more of the… whatever-they-were came out of the light and stood there looking around for a moment.

Those things were ugly. And creepy. (And tough kills, we found out.) Essentially, they were insect-like, larger than man sized— around seven feet tall, with that three-sectioned body that is typical of insects. They ran on four of their six legs— they'd have been over ten feet, if they'd walked on two— and used the other two to attack with. All six limbs had way too many joints, something on the order of four elbows per limb, and the front two limbs were tipped with "hands" that had five fingers and two opposable thumbs, each of these tipped with long, nasty claws. The narrow spots between their three-sectioned bodies weren't as proportionately narrow as a normal-sized insect's would have been, and seemed to be well armored. Their heads looked… disturbingly human-like, though they, too, were naturally armored, and about the size of a big watermelon.

"Lydia, Dawn, Sh'rin, Whitey, get the girls inside!" Buffy snapped. "Rose, Elaine, Chantelle, Jocelyn, we cover their retreat. Jocelyn, Chantelle, go for ranged attacks! Willow, do what you can, but don't close the gate down if you don't have to— we don't know what's going on!"

"Are you NUTS!?" the woman in the red costume yelled, "If somebody can close that thingamabob, DO IT! Those things will KILL YOU IF THEY CAN AND THERE ARE MORE THROUGH THAT LIGHT!"

I dove for my sports bag, resting against a nearby tree, while Mom ran for the tree against which her personal bow rested. (I loved that bow, but Mom was better with it. A metal composite bow made for Slayer strength, it had a three hundred pound pull that dropped to one-fifty on the draw and arrows made to take the strain of that kind of strength.) I came up with a bandolier of crazy-discs, two of them explosive, a second bandolier of throwing knives, dropped those over my shoulders (I'd practiced that since a couple of days after I woke up after Warren killed Royal, and I was good at it— they fell into the right place without me so much as having to shrug to adjust them), and, for good measure, my longsword, which I held left-handed. Sure, I'm ambidextrous about weapons, especially thrown weapons, but I wanted my slightly-smarter right hand free for throwing.

I'll give the woman who'd dived through that gate credit— she didn't lack guts. She dove straight at the first one through, fists and feet flashing with a speed that I thought only Slayer-powered muscles could have produced, and she engaged the front one without letting it advance— thus crowding the others, making it hard-to-impossible for them to get at us and the trainees quickly or easily. Only thing I couldn't figure out was what the mystery Slayer was doing in some sort of superhero costume….

Anyway, her attack on the front one gave me and Mom a couple of shots each. Mom took the one that had started trying to edge around the first one on her side, sent three arrows at it so fast that the first one hit just as she released the third. The first two bounced off the thing's armored head, and it turned to hiss-scream at her— just in time for the third to punch through its mouth and out the back of its head at an upwards angle. It staggered towards her, all grace and care gone, knocking the first heavily forward— and giving the new Slayer a free shot at the first one.

It had been swinging at her with both arms repeatedly, forcing her to block with both of her arms, or dodge— but since she didn't want to retreat, dodging was tough. If she hadn't been incredibly agile, I think she'd have been toast. As it was, when the one Mom killed staggered heavily into the new girl's opponent, its arms flew out sideways for balance or from the impact— and the Slayer in Red did a handspring and kicked up into the thing's chin, bending its neck sharply— and apparently fatally. It staggered forward as it died, knocked her down— but was dead or maybe just dying, and in no shape to take advantage of that.

I'd already flung two knives at the third one, put out one of its eyes, and it was charging me now that it had a clear path. I grinned— and went all Capoeira on its sorry butt. I knew I most likely couldn't hurt it hand-to-hand, it had too much armor. But if it couldn't hit me for my insane acrobatics and dancing, well, that worked, too— because I'd made it so mad that it wouldn't stop trying. If it was chasing me, it wasn't hurting anyone else.

It chased me while Buffy, Aunt Elaine and Aunt Rose went after the fourth, confusing it with multiple targets, and giving Mom shots at it. The Slayer in Red crawled out from under the monster she'd killed, looked around, looked back and forth between me and the gate-light, then started my way, since nothing else seemed to be trying to come through.

"I'm good!" I called, even as I did a series of whip-its around the thing. "Watch the gate!"

She hesitated— then turned back to the gate.

Even as she did, Ripley, flying with the other pseudo dragons well above the battle to stay out of range of being hurt, sent me a thought.

*Base of head, at back,* she sent, her sharp predator's eyes having seen its weakness. *I see soft spot— to make so can bend, maybe?*

"Good job, Ripley!" I cried, delighted with her sharp mind. "Relay it to the others!"

A moment later, Buffy and my aunts started leading their demon away a little, lining it up so that Mom had a straight shot at the back of its head.

*Willow sends through Dingo that as soon as last one is farther away from light, she will make light go away,* Ripley sent— and I saw something that puzzled the hell out of me.

The Slayer in Red was looking around wildly, like she had no idea where the voice of my friend was coming from. How could she not know about pseudo dragons? Even if she was one of the few Slayers without a pseudo dragon friend, she'd know about them.

Well, no time to worry about that— monsters to kill!

While Buffy, Aunt Rose and Aunt Elaine tried to get the one chasing them to a good place for Mom to kill it, I went even more crazy with the acrobatics and dancing of Capoeira, bouncing around my opponent with a serious eye to making it confused. Finally, I stopped moving, as it seemed to get both dizzy and slower, and I snatched a crazy-disc (non-explosive variety) off of my bandolier, flung it to one side, then got both hands on my sword and went super-defensive, holding my place and blocking the thing's razor claws for a couple of seconds—

I heard this wet, meaty "thunk," and the thing stood very still for a moment— then sank to the ground, dead as could be. Only about an inch of the six-inch-diameter crazy-disc stuck out of that soft spot at the base of its head.

Even as Mom fired at the base of the last one's head, killing it, Willow cried, "And DONE!" in her big-echoey-powerful-spell voice— and the light just… went away, collapsed.

Immediately, the Slayer in Red let out this big explosive sigh and flopped to the ground, sitting back-but-upright with her weight on her arms and breathing heavily.

"That," she gasped, "was not fun. I've had fun, and it bore no resemblance to fighting… giant mutant ant-things from Outer Don't Go There.

"Speaking of Outer Don't Go There… somebody want to tell me where here is, and how the homina I got here from that wretched hive of scum and villainy that some people like to call Pittsburgh? 'Cause I gotta tell you, this doesn't smell a thing like Pittsburgh (and that's a good thing)!"

For a moment, we all just stood and looked at her. I managed to figure out that the white thing on her chest and back was some sort of spider-symbol, stylized and kind of creepy.

Buffy walked over and stood in front of the Slayer in Red, offered her a hand up. The woman took it, got to her feet (though she seemed a tad bit unsteady, now) and looked Buffy up and down.

"You know," the Slayer in Red said in a tone that seemed to think something was funny, "You bear an uncanny resemblance to Buffy the vampire slayer."

"That's because I am Buffy Harris," Buffy said easily. "You're a Slayer, obviously— where are you from, and what the heck are you wearing?"

"Buffy… Harris?" the Slayer in Red replied— and I saw Aunt Rose look kind of startled suddenly, and start that way. "Like in, what, you married Xander? Not that I can't see that, he's a great character, but— wait, you think I'm a Slayer!?"

"Character?" Buffy said blankly. "Xander's got his funny moments, but— of course you're a Slayer, how else did you get so strong? So fast?"

"Uh, Buffy… look at her clothes," Aunt Rose said, stepping up beside Buffy. "I think… Buffy, Colin alert!"

Buffy looked blank for a moment then said, "Oh. Uh-oh?"

"Somebody want to let the superhero in on the secret?" the woman in red asked, sounding a little worried.

"It's… complicated," Aunt Rose said. She took a deep breath and said, "Look, you're Spider-woman, aren't you?"

"Tragically, yes," the woman muttered, then nodded and said in a normal tone, "At last, a fan! It only took a week, too— you'd think that after seven days of making the streets of the Pitt safe, more people would recognize me."

"Look, Spider-woman," Aunt Rose said slowly. "This isn't going to be easy, but… this is Buffy Harris, used to be Buffy Summers. The Slayer, the Prime Slayer, the one who's in charge. And that's Willow Rosenberg over there. And I'm Rose Killian."

"Sorry, that last one's a blank," Spider-woman said. She sounded stoned, or badly, confused. "But… Buffy? Willow? Xander… only, what, five years after Sunnydale, maybe? Or is it less?" She looked at Aunt Rose and asked, "Are you Baseball Girl?"

"Flatterer," Buffy said, sounding pleased. "Sunnydale sank fifteen years ago and change… Spider-woman, right?"

"Fifteen— what year is this!?" Spider-woman asked, her voice very small.

"It's 2018, of course," Buffy said, looking puzzled. "Wait, are you—"

"Oh, crap." Spider-woman's voice was small, and she began to weave even more on her feet. "First I'm a girl— now I'm freaking thirty!?"

With that, she collapsed— but Buffy caught her before she hit the ground.

Immediately, Aunt Dawn and Aunt Sh'rin, who'd been watching from the dorm in case of casualties, came charging out and bent over… Spider-woman, whoever that was. I didn't recognize the name, but Aunt Rose plainly knew of the character.

"Wait!" Aunt Rose said sharply as Sh'rin reached for Spider-woman's mask. "Listen, Sh'rin— to that woman, what you're about to do is… past rude. It's— she'd be furious."

"I must see her face to help her," Sh'rin complained.

"That's fine, but get her indoors, first, at least," Aunt Rose said. "Somewhere where not everyone can see her face."

"I'll get her— Chantelle, you have a spare room still, don't you?" Willow asked. "In case she needs to stay for a bit, or we can't figure out how to send her back right away?"

"Got two, use the guest room on the first floor," Mom agreed. She hesitated, then said, "Hey, Rose? Should somebody familiar go with her, or what?"

Aunt Rose shook her head, unsure. "I'm going to go, I… remember a little bit of stuff about her from what I read. But Buffy seemed to freak her some, so… Jocelyn? You're close to the age I think she is, will you come?"

I looked around, found Daddy— he was standing ten yards or so back, watching calmly— and tilted my head to ask permission.

"Go on, Rose is the expert," Daddy agreed, and I turned to trot after Willow, Aunt Sh'rin and Aunt Dawn as they went towards our house, Willow telekinetically floating Spider-woman along.

We got her into the guest room, Willow set her on the bed— and promptly left, saying, "Comic book character, fewer people seeing her face is good until she's… had time to adjust.

"In fact, maybe the pseudo dragons should wait in the living room? Not so many shocks at once, that way."

The pseudo dragons all agreed, not wanting to upset someone who'd fought with us, and flapped off to wait until called.

Aunt Sh'rin and Aunt Dawn peeled the remains of that red and ivory costume off of her, leaving her in modest panties and a sports bra, and I got a look at Spider-woman. Her face was really pretty, oval, with high cheekbones, a full mouth, and a straight, even nose that fit her face. Her body— she was too thin, but not as bad as Mi Kyong had been when we'd rescued her from North Korea. Still, you could tell that she hadn't been eating right— or, for that matter, maybe not living right. She was filthy, and several cuts on her body looked red and inflamed, as though they were infected. And in spite of all that, she was kind of sexy…. Definitely female, but built on slender lines.

"Undernourished, but not malnourishment, yet," Aunt Dawn said as she looked at some of the inflamed cuts. "Probably why she's not fighting off the infection so well."

"I'd guess she hasn't eaten well for perhaps a week," Aunt Sh'rin said in agreement. "And I think… she seems to have a cold, or perhaps the flu. A low-grade fever."

Very suddenly, Spider-woman jerked awake and sat up, crying, "Mask!" as she did and trying to cover her face with her hands.

"Easy, easy," Aunt Dawn said, "Listen, Spider-woman… you're not on your Earth, so no one here's going to recognize you, it's okay."

"Not… on… holy crap." She lowered her hands and took a deep breath, then opened her eyes. "Oh. Hey. Yowza! Buffy's little sister, right? Dawn?"

"Yes, I'm Dawn," she agreed, and smiled. "Dawn Innes, now, not Summers."

"Yikes." Spider-woman shook her head. "Okay. I'm… uh, you're not going to believe this, but… you can call me Peter? I guess?"

I blinked. Aunt Rose sighed and said, "Oh. So… uh, you didn't keep the Jessica Drew name, smart."

"No way," Peter said, shaking her head. "The CIA came up with that, and Nick Fury and SHIELD were sure to find it in the documents after… after Spider-man and I beat the snot out of Doc Ock."

"Good, that's smart," Aunt Rose said, and moved a little closer to the bed. "Okay. So the last thing you know about us is the closing of the Hellmouth?"

"Yeah." She nodded, winced a little, twisted her neck until it popped. "Ah, better.

"Yeah, the last season of the TV show ended with the Hellmouth closing and the Scooby Gang looking out over the pit, and Dawn… you said something like 'what do we do now,' and Buffy… she smiled. That was the last shot of the show."

"We were… a TV show." Aunt Dawn shook her head.

"What are you complaining about?" Aunt Rose asked, grinning. "It got cancelled before I got to be on screen.

"Hey— was Dawn played by the girl from— wait, what year are you from?"

"It was 2003," Peter said.

"Crap. You wouldn't have seen her in Mercy," Aunt Rose said. "Never mind, not important.

"Look… Dawn and Sh'rin— Sh'rin's the one with the skin to die for— they're healers. Let them look you over and do what they tell you, okay? Then we can talk about other stuff."

"Sure, and thanks," Spider-woman said. "Um. I don't want to be rude, really, I don't, but could I get something to drink?"

"Of course," Dawn said. "And something to eat— soup to start, and maybe one sandwich— you need to start slow. Why haven't you been eating?"

"It's a little hard to eat when you don't have money," Spider-woman said wryly. "Little hard to get money when you can't get a job and won't steal it."

"What happened— no." Aunt Dawn took a deep breath, then concentrated for a moment before she said, "Okay. Food's been ordered. If you want, you can grab a shower— we've got some clean clothes coming, too— before you eat, the clothes will be here first."

"A shower… I think I want to marry you," Peter said— then blushed purple. "Uh, I mean— look, I— damn. Yes. Please. Shower. Clean clothes. I am your unworthy servant!

"But wait— did you go all witchy? Can you do the telepathy thing, like Willow?"

"I can," Aunt Dawn said, blushing, "but not nearly that well. I… look, did you see the little dragons flying around out there?"

"Yeah, they were… pretty cool. Seemed to be on your side?"

"They're our friends," Aunt Dawn said, nodding. "They're pseudo dragons, right out of 'Dungeons and Dragons.' I think you heard Jocelyn's friend Ripley when she told us that Willow would kill that gate?"

"That was a dragon?" Peter said, and she smiled. "I never played D and D, but I wish I had, now. Seriously? A pseudo dragon talked in my head?"

"Seriously," I agreed. "Hi, I'm Jocelyn Penobscot. That was my friend Ripley you heard out there. Would you like to meet her? And the rest of our pseudo dragon pals? They're just staying out of sight to keep from shocking you.

"Oh— and what Aunt Dawn never got to tell you, since we got sidetracked, is that she asked her pseudo dragon companion, Sunset—" Peter snorted a little laugh at that name, and I knew that I'd get along with… her, right then and there. "—and Sunset relayed to someone in the family who isn't busy to get you some clothes and some food."

"Okay, then, yes, please," Peter said, and her grin widened. "I'd love to meet some pseudo dragons."

I called Ripley, and she, Sunset, Glitter and Shimmer all came in. By the time we'd introduced them all to Peter, my sort-of-cousin Linnea (Aunt Dawn's bio-daughter) had arrived with some clean clothes, and we sent Peter off to the shower still grinning and talking over her shoulder to Sunset.

Once we heard the shower start, Aunt Dawn looked at Aunt Rose and said, "What can you tell us, Rose?"

"Very little," Rose said. "I barely remember the comics, just that she was the Ultimate Marvel version of Spider-woman, and I think she was… uh… look, you know, I don't recall much. Just that she wasn't really Jessica Drew, and I think we should wait. Let her tell it. She earned that much courtesy by telling us to back off, getting between those things and what she thought were helpless victims."

"You're right," Aunt Dawn said. "But I want her to eat first."

"I won't die of curiosity while she eats," Aunt Rose said. "Which means Jocelyn won't either, and you two are both way more patient than me or her."

"Oh, sure, pick on the teenager," I said, trying not to laugh— and not making it. "Point, I won't burn up with unsatisfied curiosity or anything.

"But while she's showering, I'm gonna get online and see if there's a girly form of Peter, because calling her Peter is messing with my mind."

I found "Peta," which sounded too much like Peter— I hoped she wouldn't like it— and Petra, which was worse. Okay, maybe she could be Peter after all….

It wasn't long— maybe fifteen minutes before Peter came out of the bathroom— I think knowing that there would be food when she came out is all that kept her from luxuriating in there— dressed in clean clothes, gray sweats and a T-shirt. Her hair had been brushed, her face scrubbed pink, and the clothes fit her pretty well— Aunt Dawn must have guessed her sizes, she's good at that.

Peter saw the tray with a big bowl of still-steaming chicken soup, a half a sleeve of crackers, and a bologna-and-cheese sandwich, complete with little packs of ketchup, mustard and mayonnaise next to it, and I swear, her eyes got teary.

"Okay," she said, looking around at us. "Thank you. Seriously. Food that's not out of a garbage can…. Thank! You!"

We all winced, and Aunt Sh'rin said, "Sit. Eat. Then we will talk. But… you should eat slowly. I know it will be hard, Peter, but you should."

"Lady— Sh'rin?" Aunt Sh'rin smiled and nodded, and Peter said, "I promise you, I will try— but don't be afraid to tell me to slow down, 'cause you may have to!"

Aunt Sh'rin nodded, and we all turned to talk to each other, giving Peter modicum of privacy while she ate. Only once did Aunt Sh'rin say, "Slow down a little, please," and Peter paused long enough to say, "Yes, ma'am." After that, she apparently kept a sane pace.

After a few minutes, she spoke. "Okay. That was… heaven. Again, thank you!"

"You're welcome," Aunt Sh'rin said. "Thank you for listening and eating slowly."

"No problem," Peter said. "Always listen to the doctor, even if she's a healer instead of a doctor."

"Shall we move to a study, or would you like to lie down while we talk?" Aunt Dawn asked.

"No, no need to lie down, I feel so much better that I'm not sure I could lie down, thanks," Peter said. "Study works. Can the pseudo dragons come?"

I grinned. She couldn't have asked a question more inclined to make me like her.

"Absolutely," Aunt Dawn said, and led the way to the study on the first floor. (She knew her way around— we all practically shared houses.) Once we were all seated, Aunt Rose said, "Okay, confession time— I know the most about you, because I'm a comic book fan— but I don't know much. I always preferred DC Comics to Marvel, and you were a Marvel character."

Peter's jaw dropped, and she stared for a second before saying, "I was a comic book? You can't be—" She stopped, closed her mouth, then her eyes, took a deep breath, then opened her eyes and said, "Okay. Sorry. You guys didn't wig over some of you being a TV show where I'm from, so… I'll stay calm."

"Freak if you need to," Aunt Rose said. "I'm still grumpy over the show being canceled before I'd have made an appearance."

Peter actually laughed at that, which seemed to help. Then Ripley flew over and landed on her shoulder, head bumped her cheek, and settled there. That seemed to help even more.

"Okay. You were saying?"

"We don't know much about you, just that you're a superhero," Aunt Rose said. "Given that we'd like to help you out… well, can you tell us something about you?"

"Given that you've already let me take a shower, given me clean stuff to wear, and fed me?" Peter said, looking kind of amazed. "I'd be kind of a jackass— no, I'd be a jackass worthy of Flash Thompson, and he's a professional jackass, he's got jackass endorsement deals, you know?

"I'm not that big a jackass. So, yeah. I can tell you folks."

For a long moment, Peter sat silently, gathering her thoughts. Then she took a deep breath— and told us her story.