Part One Things Born of Fire - 1/10
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gen_storytellerSeries: We Can Run Away Now They’re All Dead and Gone.
Part One: Things Born of Fire.
Chapter: 1/10.
Author: Aurey09.
Rating: PG-13.
Summery: Set during 'Chosen' and beyond. The Scoobies leave town and sure enough trouble follows them.
Characters: Ensemble.
Disclaimer: Joss’ world, I’m just visiting.
A/N: Thank you to my beta![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
noandwhere.
Part One: Things Born of Fire.
Chapter: 1/10.
Author: Aurey09.
Rating: PG-13.
Summery: Set during 'Chosen' and beyond. The Scoobies leave town and sure enough trouble follows them.
Characters: Ensemble.
Disclaimer: Joss’ world, I’m just visiting.
A/N: Thank you to my beta
noandwhere. Buffy held herself onto the bus, with all the strength her battle-worn body could muster. She kept her grip on the bloodied scythe with a force great enough to crush bone. She tilted her gaze up wards, to meet the sight of the Hellmouth folding in on itself. The town becoming nothing more than a gaping sinkhole. The bus kept moving, ahead of the destruction.
They were alive. The bus had outrun the devastation. Faith's satisfaction was meagre, a lot of girls were gone - she didn't want to count how many.
The First is licked, what it gets for poorly impersonating the dead, Faith thought. "Ease off. We’re clear." Faith told Wood. They slammed to a halt.
They made it, Buffy was finally done with Sunnydale and it hadn't dragged her down with it. She was free of it.
The wind wrecked with vengeance across her wounds, and she closed her eyes against it. She dropped smoothly to the road below and looked down the highway, the morning’s rays rippled and glistened in the heat, it was surreal. They'd won.
Buffy waited as the inhabitants of the bus stirred within. Dawn was first to scramble from the vehicle’s emergency door, she wrapped Buffy tightly into a hug. This was the reason Dawn hadn’t let her say goodbye, Buffy hadn't been sure if this moment would come. She was able to ignore the sting from the wound from where she’d been stabbed, as Dawn’s arms constricted round her middle.
"I don’t understand," Giles said, as he came to Buffy’s side, both of them looked at the smoking crater. "What did this?" She heard the wonder in his voice; his Watcherly detachment never enough to repress the emotions there. He would want to justify and investigate what he was seeing - he was probably finding it difficult to restrain himself from cleaning his glasses until the lenses popped out.
Buffy listened for a moment, to the sounds of relief from her friends, the joy of the girls - new Slayers; an audible groan came from the crater once known as Sunnydale, but Giles question cut through it all.
"Spike." She replied, baffling Giles. Buffy felt the damage of her charred flesh, from the touch of Spike's hand and soul, badly burned but it didn’t hurt, not anymore.
The ‘WELCOME TO SUNNYDALE’ sign creaked once and then toppled backwards into the crater. There would be no more ‘come back soon’. It was the final testament to the town’s annihilation.
Xander approached Andrew, who had the look of a shell-shocked solider - or at least what shell-shock looked like in the movies. Andrew’s face was splattered with beads of blood; Xander knew. This was the moment he’d been dreading all along.
"Did you see?" He couldn’t conceal his desperation. He watched Andrew’s brain skitter and fail to know how to break the news.
"I was scared. I’m so sorry."
"Did you see what happened?" Xander searched his face. Andrew’s gaze gave everything away, before he could look away. "Was she...?"
Xander witnessed a transformation taking place in Andrew, as he found the strength to speak. "She was incredible. She died saving my life."
Xander put a comforting hand on Andrew’s shoulder. "That’s my girl. Always doing the stupid thing." Andrew gave a hint of a smile as Xander walked off to join the others.
Faith was lost as she looked down, at the guy who thought he was so much prettier than she was. Yeah right, I’m way hotter than some ex-high-school Principal. He did have something going for him, which she was lacking at this moment in time; she didn’t have a big hot stab wound working it for her. It looked bad, she’d seen a collection of wounds in her time and had often been the cause of them. It looked like some of her earlier work, the kind which nobody on the receiving end had lived through.
"It’s not that bad…" She stuttered, "You just sit here."
"That’s the plan."
"I'll get someone to --," She started to move, to look for someone else to take care of him. She wasn’t good with this sort of thing, anyone would be better to deal with this.
"Did we make it?"
He looked at her with something she couldn’t decipher; hope, knowing, but she couldn’t be certain. Human emotions weren’t her deal - now they were being dealt onto her. She owed him an answer. "We made it. We won."
He smiled, a little - then nothing. He just stared, his last thoughts slowly faded from his eyes.
Shit!
Her mind went into overdrive, grief hit like a bitch; whatever could have been between them slipped out of her grasp. She took a second, then moved to close his eyes.
Then he coughed and sputtered back to life.
She drew back a little, embarrassed but mostly happy, she didn’t have a better word for it than that.
He gave her a hint of weak grin. "Surprise."
She was pissed, she told herself, but she couldn’t help smirking. Vi came over – Faith was alright with her playing nurse-maid, Faith need to stretch her legs anyway, and had a real bad itch for a smoke.
Half a dozen new Slayers mingled by the bus, sharing the days events, leaving the true Sunnydalers to their wreckage. All thankful, after everything, to be alive. They’d endured, succeeded; the war was done, The First and its minions were toast.
The remaining Scoobys stood together, taking a moment. They’d survived another apocalypse, leaving it at the school gates or what was left of them. Willow couldn’t help wondering why the big fights always end in demolished buildings: Sunnydale High, The Initiative, the Magic Box and now the entire town.
Faith sidled over to join them. "Looks like the Hellmouth is officially closed for business." She seemed tranquil, in a way that she’d always seemed incapable of.
"There is another one in Cleveland," Giles was given a few murderous glances. "Not to spoil the moment..." He bent down and took a stone, throw it into the crater, carefully surveying the area.
"We saved the world." Xander said.
"We changed the world." Willow corrected him, with good old-fashioned awe. She realized that she was part of that, maybe it didn’t make-up for last year but it was a start. Not going an evil brunet also meant she’d done the right thing, with the spell. Willow looked toward Buffy, as her eyes brimmed with hope and connection. "I can feel them, Buffy. All over. There are Slayers awakening everywhere."
"We'll have to find them." Dawn said.
"We will."
"Yes, because the mall was actually in Sunnydale, so no hope of going there tomorrow..." Giles seemed relieved - he didn’t like the mall, he said it was garish and over crowded, to be avoided if it could be helped.
Dawn choked, "We destroyed the Mall? I fought on the wrong side..."
"All those stores gone... The Gap, Starbucks, Toys R Us... who will remember these landmarks unless we tell the world of them?" Xander sighed uncommitted, fatigue from the fight starting to set in.
Buffy remained silent as the gang went back and forth with their habitual light banter, reserved for times like these.
"We have a lot of work ahead of us..." Giles reminded them, again.
"Can I push him in?"
"You got my vote." Willow chirped happily. Giles could be a real stickler, when there was work still to be done, but she wouldn’t have expected anything else. He wouldn’t have been Giles with out the fanatical work ethic.
"I just wanna sleep, yo. For like a week."
"I guess we all could. If we wanted to."
"Yeah, the First is scrunched, so...What do you think we should do, Buffy?" Willow asked.
"Yeah, you're not the one and only chosen anymore. Just gotta live like a person. How's that feel?" The only other veteran Slayer grinned.
Buffy tried the question on for size, that hadn’t been open to her for so many years.
"Buffy? What are we gonna do now?" Dawn asked her nervously. Buffy smiled with a newfound strength and pride. They stood thinking the same thing; what next?
"So really what now… and with the doing of that now?" Willow asked.
"Yeah Buffy, seeing as mass Slaydom was your idea," Xander said. "Don’t suppose you’ve got any more bright ones, do ya?"
"We can do what ever we want to."
They all nodded in agreement, and Dawn grinned, "Cool. Nearly makes up for the lack of mall."
Faith gave Buffy congratulatory shove to the shoulder, before retreating from the potential love-in and hug-athon.
"Well not to be a killjoy," Giles said. "Yet again." He added on everybody’s tremendous sighs.
"You kid not, it’s your life’s work G-man." Xander teased.
"Never call me that, I’ve mentioned it on numerous occasions. I don’t care for it."
Xander’s one eye took on a nostalgic glint. "It’s nice just being with the vintage. Hay, maybe we’ll get to look stuff up in dusty books soon, and have donuts." He back tracked his words, thinking on them. "I don’t want to do any of those things. Donuts are just too risky, too many saturation attempt have been made against me, I have too keep stream line, with all the nearly getting killed and running away parts of life."
"Yes, as much as we all enjoy your particular brand of humour, Xander. We really must be on our way, we need to get the injured to hospital." He gestured to the girls behind them.
"Could I have a sec’?" Buffy looked at them. Willow took Buffy by the arm.
"I think we have longer than a second. Tire needs changing, won’t get far on just the rims."
"There’s a spare." Giles said.
"Changing tires, that kind of work requires Slayer strength? But since it’s like a ration of 10:1 Buffy should rest up don’t you think?" He asked Giles, pointedly.
"Well I do have that potential mortal wound. I think I’ll give buses details a miss. Give stuff a chance to sink in." Buffy moved towards the crater. Dawn went to follow, but Giles stopped her with a knowing look. Buffy needed to be alone.
"Spike didn’t make. Did he?" Dawn asked, she already knew the answer, and that it wasn’t just Spike, it was Anya, Amanda and all the girls she’d never had a chance to really know. Giles put his arm around her, and guided her back towards the bus.
Thick clouds of smoke bled into the atmosphere, the ash from a dozen fires coating the back of Buffy’s throat. Her whole life was at the bottom of a crater; the fire of her old world slowly smouldering to nothing. A new life was waiting for her, but she wasn’t quite done mourning her old one.
The sounds of footfall interrupted her silent meditation, they were getting closer before stopping right next to her. She knew who it was. She let the silence pass between the two of them.
"Hi, Xander."
"Hi." Xander fidgeted with his hands, he finally settled on his pockets as the best place to put them.
He’d lost his good mirth and cheer for a second, before it bounded back. "So, one grieving person to another. How you feeling?"
"Bittersweet."
"Yeah, I know. They both came through heroes," He shook his head. "Doesn’t make it burn any less though, does it? But then I think she saved Andrew’s life…" An uneasiness crept into his voice, he countered with a smile. "Nope that really doesn’t help." They both continued to stare over the edge.
"Not gonna jump are you? Because, I don’t like it when you do that."
"No, my feet are grounded. Just thinking." He put an arm round her shoulder.
"Would these thoughts be ‘anywhere but here’ type fantasies?"
"Still, Amy Yip at the Waterslide Park?" Buffy said knowingly, he always used to go for the same one, every time.
"Nope and strangely enough Willow’s dream date is no longer John Cusack." He gave Buffy a feeble grin, holding tightly onto it, before it turned on him. None of them were the same, for years they’d been drifting apart, sure they pulled back but it was never like it was in high-school. The silence grew stale; Xander was probably thinking along the same line as she was.
"We’ve all changed, sometimes I think maybe too much." She kicked a rock into the gap, listen as it hit the sides, she lost the sound of it, on its way down to the bottom. The gash in the land was deep, she wondered if it would ever heal.
"Yeah, we drifted apart for a long time there."
"Think we can get back?"
"Sure we can." Willow walked towards them.
"I’ll endorse that, she’s the smart one." Xander said.
"Always have always will be," Willow said. "We changed an ancient mystical line; I think that proves we’re pretty much good for anything." Willow grinned.
"We’ve gone through a lot; it’s not like we’ll ever be who we were." Buffy said, thinking how that was clearly an understatement.
"Yeah," Xander agreed, all wise and Zen. "So how about that trip to the mall? Okay, so it’s at the bottom of a crater, but bright side no cues, and all the burnt and crushed merchandises you could ever want." The girls smiled at him - same old Xander.
++++
They were alive. The bus had outrun the devastation. Faith's satisfaction was meagre, a lot of girls were gone - she didn't want to count how many.
The First is licked, what it gets for poorly impersonating the dead, Faith thought. "Ease off. We’re clear." Faith told Wood. They slammed to a halt.
++++
They made it, Buffy was finally done with Sunnydale and it hadn't dragged her down with it. She was free of it.
The wind wrecked with vengeance across her wounds, and she closed her eyes against it. She dropped smoothly to the road below and looked down the highway, the morning’s rays rippled and glistened in the heat, it was surreal. They'd won.
Buffy waited as the inhabitants of the bus stirred within. Dawn was first to scramble from the vehicle’s emergency door, she wrapped Buffy tightly into a hug. This was the reason Dawn hadn’t let her say goodbye, Buffy hadn't been sure if this moment would come. She was able to ignore the sting from the wound from where she’d been stabbed, as Dawn’s arms constricted round her middle.
"I don’t understand," Giles said, as he came to Buffy’s side, both of them looked at the smoking crater. "What did this?" She heard the wonder in his voice; his Watcherly detachment never enough to repress the emotions there. He would want to justify and investigate what he was seeing - he was probably finding it difficult to restrain himself from cleaning his glasses until the lenses popped out.
Buffy listened for a moment, to the sounds of relief from her friends, the joy of the girls - new Slayers; an audible groan came from the crater once known as Sunnydale, but Giles question cut through it all.
"Spike." She replied, baffling Giles. Buffy felt the damage of her charred flesh, from the touch of Spike's hand and soul, badly burned but it didn’t hurt, not anymore.
The ‘WELCOME TO SUNNYDALE’ sign creaked once and then toppled backwards into the crater. There would be no more ‘come back soon’. It was the final testament to the town’s annihilation.
++++
Xander approached Andrew, who had the look of a shell-shocked solider - or at least what shell-shock looked like in the movies. Andrew’s face was splattered with beads of blood; Xander knew. This was the moment he’d been dreading all along.
"Did you see?" He couldn’t conceal his desperation. He watched Andrew’s brain skitter and fail to know how to break the news.
"I was scared. I’m so sorry."
"Did you see what happened?" Xander searched his face. Andrew’s gaze gave everything away, before he could look away. "Was she...?"
Xander witnessed a transformation taking place in Andrew, as he found the strength to speak. "She was incredible. She died saving my life."
Xander put a comforting hand on Andrew’s shoulder. "That’s my girl. Always doing the stupid thing." Andrew gave a hint of a smile as Xander walked off to join the others.
++++
Faith was lost as she looked down, at the guy who thought he was so much prettier than she was. Yeah right, I’m way hotter than some ex-high-school Principal. He did have something going for him, which she was lacking at this moment in time; she didn’t have a big hot stab wound working it for her. It looked bad, she’d seen a collection of wounds in her time and had often been the cause of them. It looked like some of her earlier work, the kind which nobody on the receiving end had lived through.
"It’s not that bad…" She stuttered, "You just sit here."
"That’s the plan."
"I'll get someone to --," She started to move, to look for someone else to take care of him. She wasn’t good with this sort of thing, anyone would be better to deal with this.
"Did we make it?"
He looked at her with something she couldn’t decipher; hope, knowing, but she couldn’t be certain. Human emotions weren’t her deal - now they were being dealt onto her. She owed him an answer. "We made it. We won."
He smiled, a little - then nothing. He just stared, his last thoughts slowly faded from his eyes.
Shit!
Her mind went into overdrive, grief hit like a bitch; whatever could have been between them slipped out of her grasp. She took a second, then moved to close his eyes.
Then he coughed and sputtered back to life.
She drew back a little, embarrassed but mostly happy, she didn’t have a better word for it than that.
He gave her a hint of weak grin. "Surprise."
She was pissed, she told herself, but she couldn’t help smirking. Vi came over – Faith was alright with her playing nurse-maid, Faith need to stretch her legs anyway, and had a real bad itch for a smoke.
++++
Half a dozen new Slayers mingled by the bus, sharing the days events, leaving the true Sunnydalers to their wreckage. All thankful, after everything, to be alive. They’d endured, succeeded; the war was done, The First and its minions were toast.
The remaining Scoobys stood together, taking a moment. They’d survived another apocalypse, leaving it at the school gates or what was left of them. Willow couldn’t help wondering why the big fights always end in demolished buildings: Sunnydale High, The Initiative, the Magic Box and now the entire town.
Faith sidled over to join them. "Looks like the Hellmouth is officially closed for business." She seemed tranquil, in a way that she’d always seemed incapable of.
"There is another one in Cleveland," Giles was given a few murderous glances. "Not to spoil the moment..." He bent down and took a stone, throw it into the crater, carefully surveying the area.
"We saved the world." Xander said.
"We changed the world." Willow corrected him, with good old-fashioned awe. She realized that she was part of that, maybe it didn’t make-up for last year but it was a start. Not going an evil brunet also meant she’d done the right thing, with the spell. Willow looked toward Buffy, as her eyes brimmed with hope and connection. "I can feel them, Buffy. All over. There are Slayers awakening everywhere."
"We'll have to find them." Dawn said.
"We will."
"Yes, because the mall was actually in Sunnydale, so no hope of going there tomorrow..." Giles seemed relieved - he didn’t like the mall, he said it was garish and over crowded, to be avoided if it could be helped.
Dawn choked, "We destroyed the Mall? I fought on the wrong side..."
"All those stores gone... The Gap, Starbucks, Toys R Us... who will remember these landmarks unless we tell the world of them?" Xander sighed uncommitted, fatigue from the fight starting to set in.
Buffy remained silent as the gang went back and forth with their habitual light banter, reserved for times like these.
"We have a lot of work ahead of us..." Giles reminded them, again.
"Can I push him in?"
"You got my vote." Willow chirped happily. Giles could be a real stickler, when there was work still to be done, but she wouldn’t have expected anything else. He wouldn’t have been Giles with out the fanatical work ethic.
"I just wanna sleep, yo. For like a week."
"I guess we all could. If we wanted to."
"Yeah, the First is scrunched, so...What do you think we should do, Buffy?" Willow asked.
"Yeah, you're not the one and only chosen anymore. Just gotta live like a person. How's that feel?" The only other veteran Slayer grinned.
Buffy tried the question on for size, that hadn’t been open to her for so many years.
"Buffy? What are we gonna do now?" Dawn asked her nervously. Buffy smiled with a newfound strength and pride. They stood thinking the same thing; what next?
"So really what now… and with the doing of that now?" Willow asked.
"Yeah Buffy, seeing as mass Slaydom was your idea," Xander said. "Don’t suppose you’ve got any more bright ones, do ya?"
"We can do what ever we want to."
They all nodded in agreement, and Dawn grinned, "Cool. Nearly makes up for the lack of mall."
Faith gave Buffy congratulatory shove to the shoulder, before retreating from the potential love-in and hug-athon.
"Well not to be a killjoy," Giles said. "Yet again." He added on everybody’s tremendous sighs.
"You kid not, it’s your life’s work G-man." Xander teased.
"Never call me that, I’ve mentioned it on numerous occasions. I don’t care for it."
Xander’s one eye took on a nostalgic glint. "It’s nice just being with the vintage. Hay, maybe we’ll get to look stuff up in dusty books soon, and have donuts." He back tracked his words, thinking on them. "I don’t want to do any of those things. Donuts are just too risky, too many saturation attempt have been made against me, I have too keep stream line, with all the nearly getting killed and running away parts of life."
"Yes, as much as we all enjoy your particular brand of humour, Xander. We really must be on our way, we need to get the injured to hospital." He gestured to the girls behind them.
"Could I have a sec’?" Buffy looked at them. Willow took Buffy by the arm.
"I think we have longer than a second. Tire needs changing, won’t get far on just the rims."
"There’s a spare." Giles said.
"Changing tires, that kind of work requires Slayer strength? But since it’s like a ration of 10:1 Buffy should rest up don’t you think?" He asked Giles, pointedly.
"Well I do have that potential mortal wound. I think I’ll give buses details a miss. Give stuff a chance to sink in." Buffy moved towards the crater. Dawn went to follow, but Giles stopped her with a knowing look. Buffy needed to be alone.
"Spike didn’t make. Did he?" Dawn asked, she already knew the answer, and that it wasn’t just Spike, it was Anya, Amanda and all the girls she’d never had a chance to really know. Giles put his arm around her, and guided her back towards the bus.
++++
Thick clouds of smoke bled into the atmosphere, the ash from a dozen fires coating the back of Buffy’s throat. Her whole life was at the bottom of a crater; the fire of her old world slowly smouldering to nothing. A new life was waiting for her, but she wasn’t quite done mourning her old one.
The sounds of footfall interrupted her silent meditation, they were getting closer before stopping right next to her. She knew who it was. She let the silence pass between the two of them.
"Hi, Xander."
"Hi." Xander fidgeted with his hands, he finally settled on his pockets as the best place to put them.
He’d lost his good mirth and cheer for a second, before it bounded back. "So, one grieving person to another. How you feeling?"
"Bittersweet."
"Yeah, I know. They both came through heroes," He shook his head. "Doesn’t make it burn any less though, does it? But then I think she saved Andrew’s life…" An uneasiness crept into his voice, he countered with a smile. "Nope that really doesn’t help." They both continued to stare over the edge.
"Not gonna jump are you? Because, I don’t like it when you do that."
"No, my feet are grounded. Just thinking." He put an arm round her shoulder.
"Would these thoughts be ‘anywhere but here’ type fantasies?"
"Still, Amy Yip at the Waterslide Park?" Buffy said knowingly, he always used to go for the same one, every time.
"Nope and strangely enough Willow’s dream date is no longer John Cusack." He gave Buffy a feeble grin, holding tightly onto it, before it turned on him. None of them were the same, for years they’d been drifting apart, sure they pulled back but it was never like it was in high-school. The silence grew stale; Xander was probably thinking along the same line as she was.
"We’ve all changed, sometimes I think maybe too much." She kicked a rock into the gap, listen as it hit the sides, she lost the sound of it, on its way down to the bottom. The gash in the land was deep, she wondered if it would ever heal.
"Yeah, we drifted apart for a long time there."
"Think we can get back?"
"Sure we can." Willow walked towards them.
"I’ll endorse that, she’s the smart one." Xander said.
"Always have always will be," Willow said. "We changed an ancient mystical line; I think that proves we’re pretty much good for anything." Willow grinned.
"We’ve gone through a lot; it’s not like we’ll ever be who we were." Buffy said, thinking how that was clearly an understatement.
"Yeah," Xander agreed, all wise and Zen. "So how about that trip to the mall? Okay, so it’s at the bottom of a crater, but bright side no cues, and all the burnt and crushed merchandises you could ever want." The girls smiled at him - same old Xander.
++++
no subject
Date: 2007-01-27 11:52 pm (UTC)"We changed an ancient mystical line; I think that proves we’re pretty much good for anything." Willow grinned.
Pride before a fall - now where did we see that with Willow once before?
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Date: 2007-01-28 12:00 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-01-28 03:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-01-28 11:07 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-01-28 08:11 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-01-28 11:04 am (UTC)