Once Buffy's outside, she lets her feet guide her on an old route she used to follow on her patrol. Most of her focus is on a moving meditation, trying to control the void energies, and prevent them from exploding uncontrollably while she's in a civilian area. Eventually, she makes her way into one of the many graveyards on the outskirts of Sunnydale, this one bordered by trees and the woods behind it.
It doesn't take long for some acceptable targets to find her. A group of vampires spread out to surround her, one of them clearly covered in grave dirt, so a newly risen.
"Well, lookie what we have here. A little girl coming to pay her respects."
Buffy looks each of them in the eyes, and smiles as they shuffle when they see them glowing with power, "If I was you, I'd look for an easier target tonight."
The one covered in grave dirt steps forward belligerently, "Why would we do that, when everything we need is right here."
Buffy shrugs, "Well, I warned you."
As the new vampire leaps at her, she raises her left hand, palm out, and just, lets go. A crackling beam of white void energy shoots out and punches straight through the vampires chest, and Buffy turns her arm so that the beam starts cutting through the other vampires that are surrounding her. As the last one explodes into dust, she points her hand to the heavens and waits until her void reserves have emptied, and the beam shuts off on its own.
Now that she's drained, Buffy curses, under her breath, at the lack of control Tenno have with the void beam. Along with her lack of amp. Especially, the one that she spent so long putting together. Idly, she wonders if the Lotus made it through the portal without her. As she does, she rubs her chest where Ballas stabbed her, just before she herself fell into the same portal. Funnily enough, that's the last thing she remembers before waking up in the coffin.
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As she's wandering the graveyard, lost in thought, she comes across a group of mausoleums that look familiar. Looking around, she spots one that triggers her déjà vu, and she's sure she's been inside it before. After weaving her way through the graves between her and the entrance, she experimentally pushes the door, only for it stay shut. Rapping on it with the back of her knuckles, she considers how solid it seems to be. As she knows that she can't, couldn't, void jump through the bulkheads that the Corpus and Grineer used. With a shrug, she lets the void envelop her in its embrace, becoming very much invisible to those outside the void. Leaping forward, she pushes herself through the void, and makes it most of the way through the door before she's pushed back out again.
Ah well, it was worth a try. Probably means that it will successfully dissipate a void blast or two if she needs to vent. Founders only know, the local vampires wouldn't protect any bystanders. Taking a step back, she starts to really look at the entrance, as people would have wanted to get inside at one point. It doesn't take her long to find a slightly lighter section of stone, where a concealed catch sits. Pulling the catch down, the door swings open with a good shove. Beyond the door is a set of stairs leading down into the darkness. At the bottom, there is the faintest glimmer of light spilling from under a door. With a small smile, she makes her way down the stairs, and the door closes on its own behind her. At the bottom of the stairs, she makes her way through the door and stops in front of a coffee table. As she's looking at the coffee table, trying to remember just why it's so familiar, something enters her space.
From behind her, Spikey's voice calls out, "You should be careful, you never know what kind of villains got a knife at your back."
Buffy turns around with a dark chuckle, "Hey Spikey. You couldn't kill me even if you had me tied up."
"Are you so sure of that?" Spike rushes forward faster than a human would be able to react, covering the intervening space in the blink of an eye. As he gets within arms reach of Buffy, he slams into an invisible shield.
Buffy nods as she lifts her left hand, "Yes, you're dead."
"Christ Buffy, what happened to you?"
Buffy looks down, "You've hurt your hand."
Spike looks down too, "Hmm, you're right."
Buffy smiles and activates Squad regeneration. After a few seconds, Spikey's hand starts to heal rapidly, "I don't know where to start."
Spike paces away from Buffy, unsure of what to say. When he reaches one of the stone risers around the crypt, he turns back, "You can sit down, I've got furniture."
Buffy looks down at the black sofa, before sitting down while shaking her head, "You know, I think I've sat down more in the last day than I have in the last three centuries."
She watches as Spike sighs and walks over, before perching on the corner of a wooden table, cabinet, stand, something. That's when she notices the large box with grey glass on the front. Similar to the one at home, and she looks at it curiously.
Spike looks down at where she's looking, "Oh, do you like my TV, it was a bargain, I even have satellite."
"Is that what it is? What does it do?"
"Buffy, are you ok?"
Buffy's eyes snap up to Spikes, "What do you think? I had a life Spikey, I was making a difference. Granted, I'd just been stabbed through the heart, and then floated into a void portal. But still, I probably wasn't dead, maybe I was. Who knows. But they pulled me out of the void back here. Here to another life."
Spike raises his hands, "Hey, it wasn't me. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad you're back, and I'm not going to let them try to undo that. But the first I knew about you coming back was when you came down the stairs."
Buffy forces herself to relax, "I know, but my memories are still coming back. Even if I did remember everything, it's a drop in the bucket compared to the rest of my life. Void damn it, I'm over 1,000 years old, and I've been awake for nearly 600 of that. How's 20 year old Buffy summers supposed to compare to that? Depths of Demios, I don't even remember your names. I've been calling you Spikey because that's what your hair looked like last night. On top of that, I don't have any of my equipment, so void energies keep building up dangerously inside me."
As Buffy starts to cry, Spike perches on the sofa next to her, and awkwardly pats Buffy's back, "Hey, my name's Spike, so you were pretty close. It was picked because I used to use railway spikes to stake out my victims."
Buffy starts to laugh hysterically, "Oh, Spikey, you have no idea. You're like a saint next to me. I've slaughtered thousands upon thousands. Innocents? When I had to. Both during the war, and after I woke up. Where I lived, life was between a rock and a hard place, and the Tenno. We fought to keep it there, while the other two factions warred with each other, and wiped out any other factions that looked like they might be getting big enough to challenge them. Assassination, espionage, spying, slaughter, recovery, kidnapping, you name it, I've done it all in the name of keeping the peace. Then what happens? The remnants of the old war team up and try to take over the solar system."
Spike grabs his knife, "I could kill you, if you wanted. Send you back."
Buffy shakes her head, "It wouldn't work. I've died, so many times. Each time, we just get back up again. There's only one Tenno that was awake, and has ever died. And I killed him."
"So, what, you're a monster now?"
Buffy gives a low chuckle, "No, I'm not a monster. I've seen true monsters. We killed, because the alternative was worse. They didn't just kill, they experimented on their own people. They twisted people, and combined them in ways that broke them. Then they sent them to die against us. It's just, how do I fit in here? Where do I even start?"
"Hey, don't look at me. I don't exactly live in paradise here either."
"I know, but you also didn't expect me to behave in a certain way."
The two of them sit there in silence for a while. Eventually, Spike fills the silence with, "Hey, Willow's getting powerful, isn't she."
Buffy shrugs, "Honestly, I don't know. What does powerful mean? The Grineer Queens, well Queen now, control an entire race from their asteroid citadel, and are still alive because they take over the bodies of young humans."
"I guess. But you're mortal now."
Buffy laughs, "I'm not going to bet on that until I die and don't get up again."
After another long moment, Buffy sighs, "I should probably go, as I need to meditate and get a bit of sleep, before training Dawn in the morning."
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Tara's hugging Dawn, trying to reassure here that they have no plans to end the spell they used to bring Buffy back from the dead. Behind her, Willow is still reading the entry on Thermogenesis, and how certain spells can create a demon. Suddenly, Anya speaks up, "Hey, Willow, why are you smiling. It's inappropriate."
Tara turns around and lets go of Dawn so that she can concentrate on Willow's explanation, "No, no, it's good. The effect, it's temporary. It will dissipate on its own."
Xander looks at Willow, an interested gleam in his eyes, "So, what? We just have to wait it out?"
Willow nods excitedly, "Yes, exactly. When the energy of the spell dissipates, so will it. The only way it could possibly survive is if it killed the subject of the spell?"
"So, what? It kills Buffy, and bang, it's got its own body?"
"Yes."
Tara opens her mouth to say something, as what happened in their bedroom last night makes it feel like Willow's wrong. However, at that moment, Xander's eyes go white and, in a growly voice, he says, "Thanks for the tip." Before he collapses.
Suddenly, there's a who lot of activity, and what she was going to say goes out the window as Xander and Anya are hurriedly looking for their car keys.
A few minutes later, it's just her and Willow left in the shop, so Tara ventures, "Willow, I'm not sure that's…"
Willow takes her hand and leads her into the back room, "Come on Tara, we need to start a spell to enable Buffy to fight it. Otherwise it's going to kill her."
"Willow, I don't think…" Tara trails off, as she falls back into following Willow's lead.
Less than a minute later, the two of them are sat, cross legged, facing each other and holding hands. Closing her eyes, Tara easily sinks into the trance they use for casting spells together. As she reaches for the magic in the world around her, another energy wells up from inside. Frantically, she tries to fight that power, and draw on the pure magic of the world around her. Even as she does, the words of her family creep into her mind, and the trickle of magic she was managing slows to a halt as her fears of becoming a demon latch on, and she takes this new energy as proof they were right. Suddenly, Willow snatches her hands away, and Tara looks up instinctively as Willows eyes go black just before her head snaps back and she says one word, "Solid".
As Willow collapses, Tara shoves her worries back into her subconscious so that she can look after Willow.
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Buffy opens the door to her home and looks around. The whole place feels empty, as though everyone else is out. Subconsciously, she relaxes, as centuries of living alone on her Orbiter have taught her that solitude is safety. As she makes her way up to her room, her fingers absently trail along the banister, and take in the texture of the varnished wood. A simple luxury that only the upper echelons of the Corpus could have afforded, let alone had back home. The best that anyone else could have had, is a hologram overlaying a metal banister, assuming they could even afford somewhere with so much space. As she reaches the top of the stairs, she looks into the bathroom and plays with the taps for a few minutes. Another simple luxury that is almost non-existent in space-based habitats.
Walking into her bedroom, Buffy takes the time to really look at what's there. As, as much as it's her room, it is very much the room of a stranger. Slowly, she makes her way to the mirror that's almost covered in photos, wedged in both sides of the frame. There, she takes a better look at her face. A face that's a couple of years older than she remembers. Though her height hasn't changed. Reverently, she takes a photo from one side that has Veldé hugging both Dawn, and herself. Now, in the solitude of the house, she allows herself to cry for the mother she lost twice. The second time, when she had to kill her herself, after she went mad from void sickness.
As the first tear lands on the photo, Buffy tenses as something enters the area of her Mending Unity. Carefully putting the photo down, Buffy turns around to face the door, her hearing straining to hear the sound of one of the doors or windows open. She's caught off guard when a ghostly white shape charges at her, knocking her back slightly as is passes by her.
As she recovers from the blow, she manifests a Guardian Shell, the same invisible shield that she used in front of Spike earlier.
A voice whispers, "You don't belong here."
The incorrigibility of the statement catches her off guard, and the apparition reappears, and passes through her shield as though it didn't exist, knocking her back into the hall, and against the door post into the bathroom.
As she makes her way back into her bedroom, the thing calls out, "Did they tell you, you belong here?"
Buffy can't help it, she starts to laugh, "I don't belong here, and neither do you. However, only one of us is going to be leaving, and it's not me. Now, lets see if you're immune to the void, or just able to bypass my shield."
As it's currently invisible, Buffy scans the room for the threat, her right hand held ready with a glow of void energy surrounding it. As her head moves, so does the shield, always protecting her from dangers she's looking at.
As soon as the apparition reappears, she launches a Void snare, and dodges to one side in case it doesn't work. She watches dispassionately, as the white spectre is dragged into the vortex, before it disappears, and reappears behind her. As it envelops her, she muses, "So, you can be affected when you attack me, but you're not quite here. Depths of Demios, that's annoying."
As the spectre hits her around the face, Buffy blinks as she lands on the floor before starting to laugh, "You can't even hurt me can you. Oh, you can knock me around, but you're no stronger than a civilian. Well, lets find out how smart you are."
With that realisation, Buffy slowly makes her way out of her room, and down the stairs. Taking extra care not to allow herself to be thrown about, so that the house doesn't suffer. Her own void enhanced regeneration and toughness more than a match for the attacks levied against her.
As she's halfway down the stairs, Dawn, Xander, and Anya, all bundle through the front door together. Buffy looks up cheerfully, "Oh hey guys, I'm just heading out…"
Buffy frowns as the three of them look at her with a combination of confusion and alarm, a frown that deepens when Xander says, "Buffy! We here to help you. Watch out!"
"Why me? Get out of the way!" Putting action to words, Buffy dodges under a blow that would have sent her sprawling down the stairs, and void jumps out of the house. Turning back, she shouts, "Over here!"
There's a sense of grim satisfaction, as the spectre rises up out of the ground in front of her. Just as she's about to manoeuvre around it, so she has a clear shot down the street, the spectre coalesces into a physical, white, humanoid. Not willing to look a gift kubrow in the mouth, she swiftly dodges to one side before raising her left hand and letting go of the void. A beam of crackling white void energy shoots down the street for around 20 yards, before it loses cohesion, and scatters into nothing. The spectre providing only momentary resistance to the beams progress.
[AN: By default, the operator has 100 health, and they are pretty much a baseline human in the warframe universe. The void beam, on the other hand, does 2,000 points of void damage per second. That means that it takes 1/20th of a second (or 0.05 seconds) to kill an unarmoured human. Without being overloaded on void energy, an operator has 100 energy to start with. The beam can be sustained for around 10 seconds before the operator's void energy is exhausted.]
As the beam peters out after a few seconds, Xander clears his throat, "Um, Buffy? Remind me never to piss you off."
Buffy chuckles as she walks past him, patting him on the shoulder a couple of times, "No worry, you civilian, attacks for enemies only."
Xander looks at Anya and Dawn as Buffy closes the front door, "I don't know if that's supposed to be reassuring, or worrying?"
Dawn looks back at the street, "Reassuring, I think."
At the same time, Anya says, "Worrying, definitely worrying."
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The next morning sets the routine for the next few weeks, with Buffy waking Dawn at around 5 in the morning in order to learn the Vazarin way, with 30 minutes of meditation at the start and the end of the lessons. She is unrelenting in the schedule, even when Dawn has stayed up late the previous night.
Tara continues to do magic with Willow, even though it's getting harder and harder to not draw on this new energy inside her. Not that Willow seems to notice, as her ability at witchcraft continues to grow.
One day, just after winter has broken, and the trees are starting to show the new growth of spring, Buffy looks up from a book she's struggling to read.
"Dawn, should you be in school?"
Dawn looks up with a slightly guilty expression, "Uh, maybe?"
Buffy smiles wryly, "I think I'm supposed to say something like, 'Those who fail to learn History, are doomed to repeat it in Summer School.'"
Dawn looks down, "But I prefer learning from you."
Buffy puts her book down before walking over and kneeling beside Dawn. Taking her hands in her own, Buffy looks her in the eyes and says, "Dawn, I'm not going to stop teaching you. But I can't teach you the things you need to know here. I can teach you to write in Orokin or Corpus script, I can teach you the language of the Origin system. I can even teach you math, sciences, and philosophy. But I can't teach you about what you need to know in this world. Demios' heart, I can barely remember most of it, and reading is still like trying to translate ancient Greek." Dawn giggles at the comparison, "Dawn, I'm serious. I'm a warrior, Jupiter's moons I can't even go shopping without an escort, as I've punched out how many people now, because they bumped into me unexpectedly?"
Dawn giggles again, "Six, if you only include Xander once. But, Buffy, you're so much better at teaching these things than they are at school."
"Dawn, I'm not going to stop teaching you. I'm not going away again. But, Dawn, school isn't just about what you learn in class, it's also about what you learn from each other. Willow, Tara, Xander, and maybe even Anya, have all learnt those lessons already. Even I learnt those lessons. But they're not things you can learn from books, or even people like us. As we don't remember the lessons, we just live with the results. Out of that will come your own friendships and social circles. And that is probably the most important thing to learn in life."
Dawn nods glumly, "Ok Buffy."
Buffy smiles brightly, "Great, then you can start again tomorrow. Now, can you help me with this book? I've been trying to read it for the last two weeks."
Dawn laughs as she reaches over the table, and pulls the book towards her. As she opens it, she laughs even louder, "Buffy, this book is written in Spanish."
Buffy looks confused, "Really? But it's using the same letters."
Dawn looks up at her, "Really?"
Buffy nods and starts drawing out some alphabets, "Really. This is Orokin script, this is Corpus script, and this is Grineer scratch."
Dawn looks at the last one, "Wait, why did you call that one scratch?"
"The Grineer don't usually keep written records, instead everything is given orally. Their scientists use either Orokin or Corpus when they want to record stuff. So, Grineer scratch is used by the grunts to indicate important information on walls."
"What? And everyone uses one of those three languages?"
Buffy shrugs, "Two really, as the Orokin are more or less extinct. Pretty much everyone uses Corpus, even the Steel Meridian, they're Grineer that have broken their built in loyalty to the Queens."
"Why?"
"Universal communications. The Corpus control the market on computers and media, so the only language people are exposed to is the Corpus one."
Dawn shakes her head at the idea there's only one language.