Written by Voirrey
Chapter 12. (In which our heroines take up surgery.)
Both the Watchers and the Slayers were very
worried when they saw Jack. He was
obviously in pain, the wound on his shoulder was deep, showing no sign of
healing, and he looked seriously ill.
The Bringers’ knife which had caused the wound must have had some sort
of vampire poison on it. It is a well
known fact, well at least to those in the Slaying business, that the best
medicine for a non-healing vampire is Slayer blood. This is not something that vampires often
have easy access to – but there were three Slayers in Jocasta’s flat, gathered
around the ill vampire. Roxy was not at
all keen on providing a full vampire meal of her blood, thank you, and suggested
before any biting stuff perhaps they could try dripping Slayer blood directly
into the wound – she would donate ooh, at least a finger full herself.
The other Slayers were less unhappy about
providing a pint or two for a Jack meal, but agreed to try Roxy’s way
first. As the blood dripped onto the
wound, everyone watched intently, looking for signs of healing. If they had not been watching so closely they
may not have spotted what Roxy saw – something wriggled in there - gross!
So, not poison, but a parasite. Neither Jocasta nor James knew immediately of
any vampire parasite, but Jocasta felt that the easiest way of identifying it
would be to have it out of Jack, and visible.
The general feeling was that suction might be the best way to get the
parasite out – drop some more Slayer blood onto the open wound, wait for the
parasite to come into view again, and suck it out. Teresa suggested asking Sally Phantom for
help – dentists have suction equipment after all, but Jocasta wasn’t keen on
this idea, when Roxy had a brain-wave – make the wound a little larger, and
then use Jocasta’s Dyson to suck whatever it was out!
This could be done immediately, and so the Dyson
was plugged in, Teresa cut quickly into Jack to make the wound larger, and more
Slayer blood was dripped into it. As
soon as movement was spotted again the Dyson was placed over the wound, and
almost immediately something could be seen in the dust chamber – success!
Jack began to feel better almost straight away,
and the Watchers began trying to identify the blob in the Dyson – it was rather
amoeba like, greyish – and Jocasta found it in a rather large tome fairly
quickly – it was a soul-eater, used to curse ancient Egyptians. Exposure to sunlight would kill it – so the
Dyson was put out into the yard in the daylight, and the blob shrank away and
disappeared.
Only Jocasta seemed to think that a soul-eater
was an odd thing to use to damage a vampire – and odder still that it had been
so successful. The others were all too
busy poring over the Prophecy.
Those who had been in Peru had already puzzled
over this – the others were all desperate to see it – to try and decipher it
and find out whether they might be mentioned in it.
“The Prophecies of
the third millennium”
Know ye the signs of the approaching evil and the Fellowship of
the Ring which shall oppose it.
In the first year
of the third millennium the two towers shall fall.
Then the second
year shall see the Return of the King that was dead, to his first place, with
less talk.
In the third year
the three great evils shall rise up. The
Lord of the Smoking Mirror, who is Lord of Vampires; the Lord of the Mirror of
the Dead, whose power is lies; and the Lord of the Mirror of the Sands, who is
Lord of Wishes.
Then shall the
Council of the Eye be shattered in fire and smoke, by many barrels of black
powder. Those who survive must seek out
the Rings and gather the Fellowship.
The rings are in
far Ethiop, in the Kingdom of the Bugande, in the Cave of the Dark Guardian
beside the great lake. Mighty is his
power, and great the trials that must be overcome.
These are the
Rings:
Nine for mortals, servants of the Eye that has fallen.
Seven for warriors, Slayers, the Chosen Ones.
Five for the Undead reborn. Evil not evil, soulless with
souls.
One reborn child of time, linked to my own death, healed by
shadow.
One reborn child of Heaven, cursed by vengeance.
One reborn fool for love, driven by guilt and shame.
One reborn dreamer, remade in tears of grief and despair.
One chosen to die, like yet unlike, reborn in love beyond hope.
Three for the foolish children.
The dreamer, our Lady, chasing that which is not for her.
The knight errant, daring mortal peril lest he disappoint his dark
lady.
The key, the never-born, the thief.
One for the Golem. Mind of stone, muscles of lightning, bottom? seat? buttocks? of
gleaming gold.
(Plain Text
version of the Prophecy)
Jocasta pulled Jack to one side – he would seem
to be ‘One reborn child of time, linked to my own
death, healed by shadow,’ especially since on looking up Father Lopes Jocasta
had found that his date of death was 1582 – Jack’s year of birth. But the prophecy said that this was one of
the ‘soulless with souls’, so was this something about Jack that he hadn’t
mentioned – something that was definitely not known to the Watchers’
council?
Jack considered the question – he wasn’t really
sure that he knew the answer – could Jocasta define having a soul? Actually he did know the answer, he just had
never bothered to think about it in any detail, or mention it to anyone. The first eclipse after he had been turned
had seemingly ‘healed’ his soullessness – he had become more aware of what he
was doing, and had been able to control his vampirism to suit himself –
continuing to live as a mercenary, or a miner when there were no wars, feeding
whenever he needed, but only on the enemy, or people that he thought the rest
of the world might be better off without.
Generally his moral code had no major problems with any of this – he was
born into a Reiver family, and just continued to live as one, adjusting to
whatever the time brought. Having a soul
was part of him, if that’s what it was.
This was probably why he and Rosa had been together for so long, until
it was Rosa who changed so much that Jack felt he no longer knew her. It also explained why he could be so badly
damaged by a soul eater – and whichever enemy it was – probably The First, it
must have known that he was a souled vampire!
The opening line of the prophecy was easy – the
destruction of the World Trade Centre – but line two had had them all puzzled –
until James had suggested it might be about Elvis Presley, and as he had a
posthumous number one with ‘A Little Less Conversation’ in 2002 it seemed this
could well be the answer!
The rising of the three evils was very worrying
– the Lord of the Mirror of the Dead must be The First, who seemed able to
appear as anyone who had previously died (even Gabriella, who was alive – but
had been dead!). The Lord of Wishes must
be The Djinn – but who on earth, or preferably not, was The Lord of the Smoking
Mirror who is Lord of Vampires?
The Council of The Eye was obviously the
Watchers’ Council, and whilst it was interesting to note that Father Lopes had
foreseen the destruction of the Council, it was a bit late to do anything about
it – at least the fact that nine rings for the servants of the Eye must mean
that at least nine Watchers survived, somewhere in the world. So the remaining Watchers – of which Jocasta
and James were the only fit ones they knew about, except Giles, who was
officially an ex anyway, were to lead an expedition to Ethiop.
Ethiop itself was fairly obvious – a little
study would be needed to find the kingdom of the Bugande, and the exact
location, but shouldn’t be impossible.
Then it sounded as if it would take a bit more than just collecting
these rings – great trials sounded a bit ominous!
So, after the nine rings for Watchers, seven
rings for Slayers – well The First had already counted those off for them when
he appeared as Napoleon – Roxy, Gabriella, Teresa, Sally Phantom, Buffy
Summers, a girl called Faith, and a girl called Kat. Kat was in
Then five for the soulless with souls – well
Jack was number one, and number two could only be Angel/Angelus - Buffy could
probably help with his whereabouts as well, although Watchers’ records showed
him to be in
Three for the foolish
children? Our Lady
– Madonna – Donna? Chasing that
which is not for her – the Watchers and Slayers could see that this was Donna –
who firmly believed that she could become a Slayer as long as she worked hard
enough. For Donna accepting that she
would be part of this Fellowship of the Ring was exciting, but also somewhat
disillusioning as she had to accept that she was not going to be able to train
herself into a Slayer.
The Knight Errant with the dark lady – that had
to be Ross – Gabriella was his dark lady, and he had faced a few things he
might otherwise have run away from, just because he didn’t want to look weak in
front of her!
But number three,’ the
key, the never-born, the thief’? No-one had
any ideas. Jenny could identify herself
as the golem quite easily – she had come along with Louise at Jocasta’s
request, but the others, well possibly apart from Donna, didn’t seem to mind
her now. Jenny suggested that the bit of
translation that Manuelita’s Watcher had found difficult at the end was ‘shiny
metal ass’, a quote from her favourite television
robot Bender in Futurama! Jocasta noted
to herself that Jenny was becoming more like a normal teenager every time she
saw her – it must be wonderful programming – when you remembered that it was
all programming, which was getting harder to do!
The only answer to the remaining puzzles was to
contact Buffy and Giles, then Kat and Anita.
The call to Sunnydale was very useful -the
‘reborn fool for love, driven by guilt and shame’ was apparently a vampire know
as Spike, previously William the Bloody, a slayer of Slayers –but now
apparently re-souled, and in Sunnydale.
The ‘reborn dreamer, remade in tears of grief and despair,’ they
couldn’t help with, and the one ‘chosen to die, like yet unlike, reborn in love
beyond hope’ wasn’t obvious to them either.
However Buffy immediately identified the third
‘foolish child’ as her sister Dawn, although she said she wasn’t able to go
into exact details, but Giles also said ‘Dawn’ as soon as he heard that line,
so obviously right. Buffy and Giles were
able to confirm Angel’s whereabouts, and said that actually he knew exactly
where Faith was – he’d kept in touch, so two more ring bearers found.
Just as helpful was having Spike put on line –
he knew an awful lot about Ethiop (an old name for
(See fic Whitby in Winter – rating NC-17)
Chapter 13 (In which
our heroes and heroines face trial and tribulation in far Ethiop, and find
another ring bearer.)
Roxy’s parents took
the ‘Slayer Thing’ remarkably well.
Jocasta had thought in the past that anyone who named their daughter
after a prostitute in a Police song were probably not totally conventional, and
might be easier to explain it to than, for example, Ross’s parents, and she was
right.
It became clear that
the best way forward would be for everyone to go to
‘Xeroderma
Pigmentosum’ a disease that causes the sufferer to develop severe blisters and
burns in the slightest sunlight – that was the answer to the Jack problem –
sufferers of the most severe form usually only go out
of doors during daylight hours if wearing something like a space suit. A little research on the Internet came up
with a type of clothing which was SPF50, and would do as protection for Jack’s
body, and an all enclosing cap and mask of the same fabric should do for his
head – just think Michael Jackson, as Roxy said, and a ‘medical certificate’
explaining that he needed this protection because of Xeroderma Pigmentosum did
satisfy airport security and cabin staff!
Safely in
The caves were a local
tourist attraction, but when the Slayer/Watcher/etc. group entered, a special
passage opened for them, and they found themselves in an arena like cave,
facing a masked Shaman figure that welcomed them, told them he knew why they
were here, and to take seats in the stands please. All were to undertake trials – those who
would not get rings would be taking them as not all ring bearers elect were
there to do so themselves! Also in the
stands was a pretty impressive blue, horned demon who introduced himself as
D’Hoffryn, there because he had the ‘demonic television rights’ to the event!
The trials were suited
to the challenger, Donna, the would be Slayer found herself facing a lion,
Ross, always anxious to impress Gabriella, found himself in a bull-fight, but
with a mighty Cape Buffalo. Louise, a
Potential Slayer, found herself up against her first vampire – all trials of
strength, speed, and wit. But not all
the trials turned out to be that simple.
Gabriella found herself in a gun fight – with
Lyle Gorch a vampire gunslinger that she had sired herself – and who was almost
as quick as she was, but not going to be killed if he lost, unlike the now
human Gabriella. They agreed with each
other to only shoot for the gun not the body – Gabriella had had to use her
brain and her persuasive powers rather than only her skill with a gun. She blew the gun out of his hand before it
was even clear of the holster, and the Shaman sent him back to the
Then Jack volunteered for his trial, and the
group found themselves back at the village outside the caves. Jocasta was told that her trial would run
concurrently, and they were told that both should strip naked! Jocasta insisted upon keeping on her
knickers, and the Shaman agreed. Jack
found himself tied spread-eagle on his back on the bare earth, with nothing to
keep him from the sun but a thatched awning, and told that if he uttered a
word, or made any attempt to move, he would have failed his trial, and the
group. Jocasta was told, along with
everyone else, to watch carefully how Jack had spent his time as a vampire, and
a giant virtual television screen appeared for them all to watch.
Scenes started appearing, each with a date. Jack was seen moving around battle fields at night,
in different wars in different centuries, with those who had gone to bring in
the wounded – but Jack was biting and draining wounded soldiers. Then a scene in which a figure guarding a WW2
concentration camp, in a uniform bearing the insignia of the ‘Britisches
Freikorps’(a unit made up of British Nazi sympathisers), turned to ‘face
camera’ and could be seen to be Jack!
Finally a scene dated only a week or two before – when Jack had said he
was going to
As this last scene faded, Jocasta was told that
it was now her choice whether Jack deserved to survive – and the only thing she
could use was her own body, and with this the thatch shade started to
burn. She had only a second or two to
decide – her own trial was beginning, and it was a test of judgement! She decided to save him, and threw herself
over him to shelter him, as fragments of the burning thatch dropped onto her
back – it was also a test of strength of mind and endurance! Then just as she thought it must be over,
someone released the Matabele ants and as they marched across her body they bit,
and bit, but she still stayed where she was, until magically the ants had
disappeared and they were back in shadow, with Jack’s bonds released.
The Shaman told them that they had both passed –
and then showed his ‘film clips’ again, only this time it became clear that any
wounded that would survive were being taken by Jack to whatever medical aid
existed at the particular time – those he bit were usually in great pain, and
beyond help. Jack had obtained his
uniform only a few minutes before the starting point of the original clip, by
killing its original owner – and he then went on to kill every other
‘Britisches Freikorps’ member at the camp, calling them filthy murderous
traitors whose blood was so tainted that he would not drink it. The final clip showed him talking to a young
girl in the same flat, in Serbo-Croat (with subtitles). He had been asked by her family to find her –
she had been kidnapped and forced into prostitution by the man Jack had been
seen killing in the clip shown previously.
Jocasta had been right to trust her own instinct regarding Jack – he had
never denied killing, but had always said he only killed people the world would
be better without, or ‘the other side’ whenever he was fighting as a soldier or
a mercenary, and the video, when seen in its entirety, confirmed this. Jack had passed his test by putting the group
ahead of his own survival instinct, and by putting his trust in Jocasta.
Lunch was served. Over lunch D’Hoffryn told Jocasta the nudity
had not been essential – but it made for better viewing figures, and so he’d
paid the Shaman to include it!
The other trials continued after lunch – Sam and
Teresa had to make a decision to put their consciences ahead of instructions,
when Manuelita was confronted by Drusilla (Yes that Drusilla) magically
transported into the arena, and they had been told that to interfere would lead
to failure. Both could see that
Manuelita was about to die, and both intervened, expecting that they had ruined
it for everyone, only to be told that they had passed - that there comes a time
when you must make your own decisions and not stick slavishly to orders.
James was confronted with a giant silver-backed
gorilla, and the others told that any verbal help could only be given in
songs. Eventually the right songs were
found to get him to behave in a gorilla friendly fashion – he had never been
intended to fight it, but to think before choosing ‘attack’, to think carefully
about advice, and perhaps to be a little less pompous than he sometimes could
be! Jenny faced a giant clay figure – a
Golem, and had to learn to think in a not totally logical fashion to outwit it.
Finally only Roxy’s trial remained. What could be a trial for a Slayer? What would frighten her enough to be a real
trial? The answer was – a very long
escalator! Roxy is frightened of
escalators, and always takes the stairs, and now a lot of people would know
about this odd fear – how embarrassing!
As the others watched on a large screen she found herself in a cavern
where a very long escalator disappeared down into the bowels of the earth, only
it was set to travel upwards towards her.
Then she was told that she had to obey the sign that dogs and
push-chairs must be carried – and provided with a very awkward push-chair, and
an even more awkward dog – one of the village strays –
all teeth and snarl! She coped with the
dog by the simple expedient of punching it hard in the teeth, and putting it
into the pushchair, then started her
journey, only to be confronted half way down by a very large troll coming the
other way, with a much more compliant, but savage, dog, and a better folding
pushchair.
Eventually she got by
it, by hitting it very hard with a push-chair full of semi-conscious dog, and
shoving it out of the way. At the bottom
she found a small table with a jewellery box on it, which was not locked, and
could be seen, on opening, to contain a number of rings. Roxy grabbed the box, and made her way back
to the escalator, which of course was now set to descend, and still contained a
large troll! She coped by shoving the
box into her shirt, and by knocking the Troll’s pushchair out of its
grasp. As soon as it was not carrying a
pushchair, and so not obeying the notice, it disappeared, and Roxy made her way
back to the top.
The escalator, the
arena, D’Hoffryn, and the Shaman disappeared, and they were back in the public
cave area with The Rings of The Prophecy.
With trepidation they decided to try the rings, and realised that there
were pictograms on each – nine identical ones with eyes on for Watchers, then a
row of seven, similar but with different pictograms – the rings for seven
Slayers – but whose was which? The
Scythe for Teresa, known as the Reaper, but which was Roxy’s – the one with the
red jewel of course (if you don’t know, go listen to the track by the Police!),
and Gabriella’s? The
‘hand shooting forth lightning’ for the world’s top gun-slinger. That left a cat (Sally? No, Kat in
Next a row of five – for the souled Undead, again with pictograms. Jack picked out one with a
similar symbol to Buffy’s but with lots of little circles all over the coat –
‘Mine,’ he said, ‘A Jack, a leather jerkin with metal rings – a fighter’s
jacket.’ The ‘angel’ was easy, and the ‘spike’ was fairly
obvious. The ‘cute little duck’ – well
there was a vampire called Drake helping Kat , the Slayer in Pittsburgh, and
the fifth had a mummy on it – perhaps that would help identify who it was for.
Three rings – Ross,
Donna and Dawn. The
knight in armour for Ross, the ‘Madonna and child’ for Donna, and the key must
be for Buffy’s sister Dawn, in Sunnydale. Now one ring (and ‘one ring to rule them all’
probably passed through more than one mind there) with a picture of a golem very like the one
she had fought – but with a shiny patch on its back – Jenny laughed and said
‘Bite my shiny metal ass!’.
The Watchers tried
theirs first, and felt more alert, more wise, more ‘Watchery
and boring’ as Roxy succinctly put it. Then the Slayers who all felt even more superhuman than usual –
more ‘Slayerish and exciting’ according to Roxy. Ross and Donna found that they felt similar
effects to those described by the Slayers – in effect they were now Potential
Slayers. Then Jack’s turn – ‘more
strength and vampirishness, probably,’ Roxy
suggested, but Jack said that no, he didn’t feel faster, stronger or fitter –
he didn’t feel anything, except perhaps disappointed. Jocasta suggested that perhaps, just perhaps,
it might instead make him less vampirish – after all the rings were
supposed to help in the up-coming fight against evil – could he possibly be
less vulnerable to sunlight? That was it
– in sunlight Jack was like a human in terms of both not bursting into flames
and also in terms of strength! Jenny
finally put on her ring – no sudden sign of wanting to dominate the world – good, but what did it do? Jenny said that she couldn’t explain straight
away, she would have to go into stand-by mode on the journey back to
Just before they drove
out of the village came a last message from the Shaman to Sam that he may have
thought his home village was a safe place, but he should think again. Sam then had to explain that he had hidden
Grace, a Potential Slayer, with his own extended family in an isolated village
some hours drive from this village, thinking that she would be safe there, but
it seemed not. The entire party detoured
and drove there to collect Grace, but arrived too close to nightfall to
consider leaving before morning.
However, the village was able to prepare itself for any attack.
(See fic Ugandan Night)
Sure enough, the
attack came that night, an attack by humans, Bringers, a couple of heavily
muscled Neanderthal looking vampires, and a guy wearing a ministerial collar
who seemed to be totally invincible, and able to throw off attacks by people,
and bullets through the head, with equal aplomb. Fortunately Roxy had had a dream when she had
fallen asleep on the journey, in which she was warned to trust the world
through Jenny’s eyes, and Jenny couldn’t see why this guy was a problem – he
looked as if all the bullets and things had had plenty of effect to her, she
just couldn’t understand why he was still standing, and so she walked up to him
and pulled his head off! Ross, a good
javelin thrower, had dusted one of what were to become known as the ubervamps
by putting an assegai through its chest – a lesson which would come in useful
in the future.
Without further
incident the party returned to
(See fic Barbie Girl)
Chapter 14 (In which Miss McStay visits the dentist, and then some very
mind-broadening travel is planned.)
Once safely home in
Sally was not happy to
even have Jocasta call around, but agreed grudgingly that she could do so. She couldn’t see much point in a ring which
was likely to increase her Slayer powers – that was, she told Jocasta, about the last thing she needed, but finally agreed to put
the ring on when Jocasta explained that all needed to be worn for the full
effect to be felt.
As it turned out,
Sally’s ring did not increase her Slayer powers, it did something which she
herself found to be much, much better than that. It gave her more control over her
lycanthropy.
(See fic WAITING FOR THE
LIGHT)
So now five Watchers’
rings, four Slayers’ rings, two rings for ‘Foolish Children’, one ring for a
member of the ‘Undead Reborn’ and the ring for ‘The Golem’ were being worn by
their designated wearers. Thirteen out of twenty five, more than half way.
Then came the next BIG snag.
Jocasta was finally able to reach Anita, the Watcher to Kat, the
Pittsburgh Slayer, only to find that Kat had gone through a Hell Mouth, to
close it, and disappeared! One member of
their group had been killed, and when Drake, the vampire group member, had
tried to sacrifice himself in the Hell Mouth instead of Kat, he had found
himself spat out as he had no soul – only to land on the
Jocasta and James
reckoned that the existence of this seventh Slayer ring should imply that there
was a seventh Slayer to wear it, and as Giles had gathered so many of the
Potentials together in Sunnydale (not to mention the three currently in
Whitby), had a new Slayer been called, they would probably know about it. Therefore the chances were that Kat was alive
in whatever dimension she had gone to. A
Slayer dream of Roxy’s tended to confirm this, and so, as the Prophecy said
that the Watchers would gather the Fellowship, and the relevant Watchers
appeared to be Jocasta and James, a rescue mission to bring Kat back would have
to be launched. Anita was really happy
when they rang her about this, and felt that this news would do a lot to
improve the morale of her group.
Plans for a trip to
the
Chapter 15.
(In which our heroines, and hero, get to meet some
Jocasta, James, Roxy,
Teresa and Manuelita started their whistle-stop tour of the States in
When they made their
way to the office of Angel Investigations they found that they had arrived not
a moment too soon – if they had arrived a moment too soon they would have met
Angelus rather than Angel, and giving HIM a ring might not have been such a
good idea! Willow
Angel seemed quite
surprised to find that he was not the only vampire with a soul – he did not
even seem to know about Spike, who only lived down the road, so to speak. He had always presumed that the vampire with
a soul who was to have a big part in the Apocalypse (or at least an apocalypse)
must be himself, he had never considered that it might
be someone else! He was, however, happy
to wear his ring. Angel had apparently bumped into Jack down a coal mine a
century or two ago, and been warned off feeding on the miners – which he had
always though odd behaviour for another vampire, but said that he could now
understand it, if Jack had a soul.
Jocasta thought privately that having a soul was probably not the main
reason that Jack would have warned Angel off, but decided not to disillusion
him.
Jocasta and James
wondered whether Wesley Whyndham-Price, now working with Angel but previously
Rupert Giles replacement as Buffy Summers’ Watcher, might be one of the Watcher
Ring Wearers, but when he tried one on it showed no sign of adapting to fit
him, or of giving him any benefits, and so he was obviously no longer in any
way a Watcher.
Willow and Faith were
heading back to Sunnydale, and Jocasta et al decided to travel along with them,
although they did wait a while before knocking on the door of Buffy’s house, to
give Willow and Faith time to fill everyone in with their news first.
(See fic Walk Through the Fire - Buffy Summers’ point
of view!)
On the whole, the
Sunnydale group were happy to meet the
Dawn’s ring distressed
her, as she said that it gave her the power to open Hellmouths
– surely a Bad Thing! However, it also gave her the power to close
any that she had opened – so definitely a Useful Thing.
Giles suggested that
they had a possible Watcher in their group, or possibly more than one. The original Scooby Gang could all be
possibles, most particularly Willow, as could Xander’s ex-fiancée Anya, but
more particularly, Robin Wood, new Principal of Sunnydale High, the son of a
Slayer and adopted child of her Watcher seemed a likely bet. Giles was right – only Robin found that a ring would mould to his finger, but then
mayhem ensued as both Robin and Spike found that their rings burnt them, and it
seemed that of all the people there, only Dawn could take the rings off their
fingers for them. Only when they became
reconciled, having a number of ‘issues’ between them, could they wear the rings
in comfort.
Although the Sunnydale
group seemed happy to meet the Whitby Group, the other way round was not so
straightforward. Teresa seemed to have a
marked antipathy for Buffy,
which they eventually resolved, and Manuelita decided that she
did not want to stay in the ‘Potentiary’, as it was much too overcrowded, and
she would prefer to continue on to
The fifth ring for one
of the Undead reborn, the one for ‘One chosen to die, like yet unlike, reborn in
love beyond hope’, the one with a pictogram of a mummy, belonged to someone in
Sunnydale, and needed to be delivered!
It was the mummy which identified the wearer – some years before Buffy
and the Scoobies had encountered a girl who turned out to be an Inca Mummy who
had been a sacrifice, and they had ‘killed’ her again to stop her killing
people by draining their life force to keep herself
‘alive’. Her remains were in an air conditioning duct in
the local museum.
Xander, under cover from an ‘educational outing’
of lots of teenaged girls (Potential Slayers), recovered her remains and as
soon as the ring was put onto her mummified finger Ampata became alive without
the need to keep on draining other people’s life force. She found this rebirth quite distressing –
not the being alive bit, but the fact that she had been in love with the
seventeen year old Xander, and the current model was nowhere near as
desirable. In fact she wanted to get
away from him/Sunnydale, and so almost immediately volunteered to also go to
It was obvious to everyone, even Buffy who tried
to find reasons why it was NOT obvious, that Dawn would have to go to
(Tales of Brave
Ulysses
- Giles point of view)
(Wind Beneath My
Wings -
Spike point of view)
Chapter 16.
(In which Miss McStay finds out why so many American homes have
basements, and that it is true what they say about unicorns!)
Anita, the Pittsburgh
Watcher, was extremely pleased to see the group, as were Cyan and Jon, the two
remaining non-vampire members of the
Teresa and Spike
managed to communicate with Drake enough to get him at least sobered up, and
then Jocasta explained how The First seemed to have used musical links to get
Teresa and Spike to do his will, and so they basically debriefed Drake before
this could happen to him. When he put
his ring on, the ‘cute little duck’ changed into a dragon – which confirmed to
Drake that this really did mean that this ring was meant for him, and that he
still had a role to play in the fight against Evil – his real name was Draco:
‘Dragon’.
It was decided that neither Jon or Cyan were likely to be very helpful in the
‘underdark’, but more useful waiting on the surface in
The rescue party,
consisting of Anita, Drake, Dawn, Spike, Jocasta, James, Roxy, Teresa,
Manuelita and Ampata set out just after daybreak to the Hellmouth, which was
under a fountain in a city centre park.
Dawn ‘knew’ that she needed to use a drop of her own blood to open the
Hellmouth, and in next to no time they found themselves in a large cave in some
‘dungeon dimension’, with a welcoming party of ubervamps waiting for them.
(El Condor Pasa – Ampata point of view)
Once they had
triumphed over the ubervamps the group went to make their way out into this new
world, only to get a very nasty shock – this was the realm of ‘The Lord of the Smoking
Mirror, who is Lord of Vampires’, and here the sun burned humans in the same
way that it burned vampires in our dimension!
Drake and Spike were much as they were in the sunshine at home, no burning,
but no vampire strength, but taking the rings off to regain vampire strength
was not an option, as they found out when Drake tried it – it brought him
immediately under the sway of said Lord of Vampires and he had to be held down
and his ring put on again to prevent him attacking any of the other group
members.
It was obvious that travel would have to be by
night, and whilst they waited for night fall, observation showed that almost
all the animals also kept out of the sunlight, grazing only under trees – and many
animals looked familiar – they seemed to have been imported from our dimension
at some time, and adapted to this one.
The first animal that seemed to be an exception was a beautiful single horned quadruped,
which approached them in a friendly manner, and, it later became apparent,
attacked ubervamps whenever it could with that single, piercing horn – the
group had been joined by a unicorn!
The unicorn was happy to be ridden – by Dawn,
Manuelita, Roxy and Ampata, but not by anyone else – so it was true, what they
say about unicorns! Dawn, Manuelita and
Roxy rode in turn – Ampata had never seen a live horse, and so was frightened
of riding this horse-like creature, but the other three agreed it was
‘cool’.
There were a number of fights with ubervamps,
and a few other nasties such as Basilisks, Minotaurs, and even a mind-flayer,
all of which were overcome one way or another.
There were a few mishaps along the way - Ampata was attacked by a
soul-eater, and began to crumble, eventually being saved by a quick-witted
Roxy, who suggested taking her ring off, letting her crumble, stamping on the
soul-eater, then putting the ring back.
It almost didn’t work, as it was difficult to find anything to put the
ring back onto, but Dawn found a finger bone, and Ampata was recovered. Spike had a unicorn-type horn of his own for
a while, which made for interesting fighting, but was not something he would
have wanted to keep for ever!
Eventually a number of hostages were rescued,
including a couple of people from Sunnydale who had been taken down THAT
Hellmouth – one was Spike and Dawn’s local Pizza delivery boy, which should
have been good for a few free pizzas!
The First made another ‘guest appearance’, this time as Abraham
Lincoln. Kat was found eventually – her
blood had been being taken regularly to use in scrying
ceremonies – a
special Slayer version of the ‘Smoking Mirrors’ of the prophecy.
Getting back to the entry to the Pittsburgh
Hellmouth entrance was too easy, and sure enough when they reached the cave it
had been booby trapped, but fortunately this was noticed, and made safe. Then a final throw of the dice by the bad
guys in the shape of a very large Hell Beast, with a huge gaping mouth. Spike had one of the phosphorus grenades Jon
had provided left, and he bowled it cricket style straight at the Hell Beast –
scoring a direct hit on that huge gaping mouth, causing it to ‘self-destruct’
in a matter of seconds!
Dawn had no trouble re-opening the Hellmouth,
everyone tumbled out, to be greeted by Cyan, and Dawn closed the Hellmouth
quickly behind them – success! Time for
celebrations! Or at least it would have
been, had there not been very bad news from home awaiting both those from
Sunnydale and those from
(The Secret
Diary of Dawn Summers Age 16 Ľ – point of view should be obvious!)
Chapter
17. (In which our heroes and
heroines visit
Injury and death had been the order of the day in Sunnydale
whilst the rescue mission had been away, and Dawn and Spike went home with
heavier hearts than they would have expected.
The news from Whitby was no better – Sally Phantom,
presumably feeling more secure since she had got her ring, had started dating
someone more interesting than usual – apparently an ex-member of the Hong-Kong
Police, but had then disappeared, leaving a house covered in blood and vampire
dust. Even worse, Jenny’s ‘aunt and uncle’ had been the
victims of a grenade attack and her ‘uncle’ was dead. Jenny, made more ‘human’ by her ring, was,
according to the e-mail from Jack, in a total state of shock.
Obviously the
Jocasta’s biggest fear on hearing what had happened was that
those who remained in Whitby would have established Sally’s exact whereabouts
and tried to stage a rescue mission when they where at less than half
strength. Once she had been able to
contact Jack, he said that they had indeed discovered where Sally was probably
being held, and had been working out how to rescue her. However as both Sam and he had come to the
conclusion that she was more use to the Chinese Triad members who seemed to be
holding her alive than dead, as a source of ingredients, although the sooner
the better, a wait of 24 or 48 hours to make the rescue more likely to succeed
would seem reasonable.
When it had seemed likely that those left in
By the time the travellers arrived at
Jenny was there with the others. Her aunt was recovering, but still in hospital,
and Jenny had been taken in by Louise’s family.
She had downloaded some of her own programming for
Louise and Donna had used
locator spells to identify a Chinese supermarket in Newcastle’s
Chinatown area as Sally’s prison, and Slayer Dreams showed that she was being
kept drugged in lynx form – this might make rescuing her without being eaten
difficult, but hopefully all rings now being worn might help. Dominique Reynard had been able to bring some
tear gas grenades, and an unmarked gun.
If the tear gas was needed, Jack and Jenny could function without it
bothering them – but they preferred her not to know this, so whilst they would
be part of the team to go into the building, Dominique, along with the still
jet-lagged group who had been to Pittsburgh, would form part of the group to
stay outside and guard their backs.
The rescue attempt was successful – but only because the
whole group of Roxettes took part in it.
Had the small group who had been left in
Jenny got her revenge.
She killed at least two of what appeared to be the ringleaders in such a
totally focused way, continuing to take them apart or beat them to a pulp long
after they were dead, that some of the others felt quite sick, but she seemed
more human and less machine like again afterwards. Sally was rescued, and returned to her human
self without her attacking any of her rescuers, for which she was as grateful
as they were. And along the way, the
Roxettes acquired a number of magical healing potions – and some Mohra Demon
blood.
Chapter
18. (In which
Roxy and Jack come to blows.)
Heading back to
Once home, Jack had a lot of thinking to do about Mohra
blood. The Chinese sorcerer had been
using blood from the captive Mohra, along with blood, bile and possibly other
bits of Sally, to produce potions of healing, and potions of invulnerability –
Jenny, having downloaded translation programmes from the internet, had been
able to read all the labels, and so the Roxettes could make use of them. Jocasta had wondered briefly about the ethics
of using ‘potion de Sally’ but it would have been wasteful to just tip them
down the sink, and so they had taken them all with them. More than one bottle contained straight Mohra
Demon blood.
To become human.
Jack had not really ever thought about it until recently, but here was
the chance, if not on a plate then in a bottle.
He feared eventually becoming so much vampire
that he would not be able to control himself, as had happened to
Most of them said it was really his own decision, but Roxy
voiced what was probably in the minds of some of the others – could he just put
the Mohra blood in the fridge or whatever, and wait until after the forthcoming
apocalypse please – after all the only practical advantage would be that if
anyone either decapitated him or staked him they could give him a proper
funeral, rather than hoovering him up! On the disadvantage side he would be less
strong, slower, and susceptible to any numbers of ways of being killed. Although as no-one was sure what the shelf
life of Mohra blood was, and so it was possible that by the end of the
apocalypse it might have gone off, he might just have to wait until the next
one came along, but they seemed to turn up as often as buses, so what was the
problem?
Jocasta had to point out that the arrival of more than one
Mohra Demon in a decade was due to the proximity of the Apocalypse, and not a
regular occurrence, if the forces of good came out on top, another Mohra might
not be on Earth for a century – and then it might not be in the same part of
the world as Jack!
In the end Jack suggested that as much of his fighting
ability was skill from years of practice and training, which he would not lose,
as Gabriella and Teresa could testify, he should still be a major warrior on
the side of good, but he would be happy to try and prove this. He would take on one of the Slayers in
unarmed combat in the sunlight, as with his ring on in daylight he had exactly
the attributes he would have were he to become human. He suggested Roxy, as she was the one he
needed to prove it to.
So it was that everyone gathered in the yard behind the
shop, and formed a ring around Roxy and Jack, who fought hard, neither of them
pulling their punches, until Jack felt he had made his point – he had not
beaten Roxy, but neither had she beaten him.
He would still be a formidable fighting force as a human, and he was
going to do it.
The transformation was not as straightforward as Jack had
expected, but it was successful, and he was now a living breathing,
heart-beating human, who discovered, much to his own relief, that he still had
his ‘affinity with shadow’. His Ring now
seemed to give him the same type of enhancement that Donna and Ross’s gave them
– he was in effect a 420+ year old, highly combat trained, Potential Slayer!
Chapter
19. (In which
Donna and Louise learn more about Wicca, and a new Ring Bearer is needed.)
Jack began to adjust to being human – more than Gabriella or
Teresa he really appreciated his sense of taste, perhaps he was more free to
notice this particular change, as he had no great guilt trip to get through –
he was just himself, but a breathing and eating self, with no need to drink
blood, he couldn’t really say he missed his demon. Neither did he miss his Shadow Magic –
because he had not lost it, much to his relief.
A couple of days after Jack returned to being human, a woman
in her early thirties with a mid-European accent arrived at Jocasta’s shop,
asking for him. She was called Magda,
and she was a Polish Wiccan, contacted by Jack to come and give lessons to
Donna and Louise. Magda agreed that both
showed natural talent, and she was happy to have them as students.
Within days of Magda’s arrival, Jenny reported something
extremely strange had happened. Her ring
had suddenly divided into two rings, and the spare one had dropped off her
finger! Nothing in the Prophecy had
mentioned this possibility – could it mean that something had happened to one
of the Ring Bearers? All at Whitby were
fine, all at Pittsburgh were fine, Buffy and Angel were harder to get through
to and, whilst Jocasta kept trying, James went back to the Prophecy – only to
find, much to his amazement, that Angel’s lines had disappeared and been
replaced by new ones:
‘One song as sweet as any cake
that climbers to the mountains take, the Holy Fool ’
So, something must have happened to Angel.
However phone calls to
But who was the new ring for? ‘Holy Fool?’ James, the classicist said the term came from
the ‘Morte d’Arthur’, and meant someone who achieved goodness through being too
stupid to be evil. Didn’t
immediately ring bells. ‘The cake
that climbers to the mountains take’ definitely did ring bells though – both
Jocasta and Jack said ‘Kendal Mint Cake’ – so someone who is too stupid to be
evil, called Kendal or Mint. Checks on
what was left on the Watchers’ Council data base brought up a fairly new
vampire from Sunnydale called Harmony Kendall.
That fitted – Harmony = song.
Eventually they got through to Sunnydale, and Buffy agreed
that Harmony had been known to her, both as a classmate and briefly as a
vampire, and she had been fairly stupid!
But Buffy wasn’t sure where she was now, although Spike thought possibly
Cordelia turned out to be in some sort of a coma, and unable
to help, but Wesley said that Harmony had been in L.A. seeing Cordelia some
time before, and he thought that her parents had a holiday flat in Cancun –
perhaps she might be there.
Chapter
20. (In which Jack meets some people from his past.)
No sooner had the expedition to find Harmony Kendall set
off, than Jack got quite a shock.
Jocasta and Jack, along with Sam and Magda, had gone out for a drink and
a meal, and were just at the coffee stage, when a group walked into the pub
where they were and approached their table.
There were five male figures, and a blonde young woman who spoke first
‘Not talking to old friends then, Jack?’. One of the men, who had a stunted arm, then
told her to leave him be – for now – he would be too chicken to get involved
with them anyway, and with that, they all swept out again. As they left one of the males, who she recognized,
dropped a small scrap of paper near Jocasta.
Jack looked stunned.
The group had all been vampires, and the one with the
stunted arm was the same ‘Corsican Brother’ that Sally had chopped the arm off
years before. The girl was Tanya,
vampire Tanya – even though Sally had checked her mouth when she had found her
corpse, and had been sure that she had only been drained, and not turned. Sally must have been wrong. The note had been dropped by a local vampire,
one who had seemed so meek and unthreatening that Roxy had not bothered slaying
him. It said ‘Help. I do not want to be involved, I don’t want to
hurt anyone, please don’t kill me.’
The next day was Saturday, and Magda was teaching Donna and
Louise how to tune themselves into their surroundings, and magically ‘listen’
to the world around them. But as soon as
the girls tried the spell Louise was doubled over in pain, sobbing, and Donna
was holding her head in anguish. Magda
linked with them, and then gently shielded them and brought them out of the
spell. That had certainly not been meant
to happen, and Magda said what they had picked up was a soul in absolute
torment, and the signals were coming from the South.
Roxy, who always hung
out at Jocasta’s on Saturdays, wondered just how far south – miles, hundreds of
miles, thousands of miles? They could
have been picking up something from the South Pole – they could have been
P-P-P-Picking up Penguins! Magda, not
really getting the joke as that advert had never quite made it to
So it would seem that Tanya had been turned by the French
vampires, and was being held in thrall as a minion, but against her will, with
her own soul trapped within her body unable to do anything. Jack was very upset,
he felt this was all his fault, and that they would have to do what they could
to save her. There was still some of the
Mohra blood left, it might still be effective – they must try and take her
without staking her, and he would administer the Mohra blood to give her a
chance to become human again.
Something else became obvious as they tried to work out where
in
The showdown came a few days later. The bad guys had moved a few miles from
Jack carried Mohra blood in a syringe, hoping to be able to
help Tanya with it.
Just outside Grosmont station is a siding where engines and
carriages awaiting renovation are stored.
There was a number of odd individuals around
these, but no-one seemed to be taking any notice of them. Magda said that there was an ‘ignore this’
type of spell in place very similar to that which had been in force in
Chinatown a couple of weeks earlier, and chatting to one or two of the station
staff showed that this had been backed up with the suggestion that anything odd
could be accounted for by ‘filming’. It
was showdown time.
The French vampire’s vampire minions numbered about twenty –
including Tanya, who could be seen coming out of an old carriage, the
The French vampire was controlling his troops from the roof
of an engine, and they charged into the attack.
Three vampires, including Tanya, attacked Roxy, who was trying to fend
off the other two, whilst taking Tanya prisoner. Jack was further along the line fighting a
fairly standard vampire, and getting the feel of his fighting strength and
speed, when he was suddenly confronted by
Jocasta was trying to fire her crossbow at a vampire who was
trying to shoot Roxy. She saw Jack fall,
but decided that as he had taken a potion of invulnerability, and a potion of
healing, he should be fine, and continued to act as a ‘rear – gunner’ for
Roxy. Dominique Reynard was closer to
Jack, and realised that potions or no potions he was totally vulnerable as he
was barely conscious and immobile, and as Roxy had proved in the
Roxy and Sally continued to fight everything that came at
them, as did Grace, Manuelita, and Jenny, whilst Ross tried to stop anyone
getting to Magda and the girls whilst they continued to break the spell. Then slowly the clouds started to lift. Then a figure could be made out between two
of the carriages, gesturing, and the clouds began to thicken again – the spell
caster. However, as he tried to hold his
weather spell together, against the combined strength of the three females,
Roxy realised that Tanya, who she was still trying hard not to kill despite
being attacked by her, was shimmering, and then suddenly she looked very
different – brown haired, heavier, and with a different voice. Well whoever she was, it probably wasn’t
Tanya, and Roxy had had enough of trying not to stake her – so stake her she
did!
Dominique returned to the fray. She fired a burst of incendiary shots at the
French vampire on top of the engine – he burst into flames. Some of the minions immediately disengaged
themselves from fighting, or stopped hovering around the fringes trying not to
fight and made an out and out dash for the nearest shadow, as the sun began to
break through again.
A train was just getting ready to leave the station, and a
figure in a beige raincoat could just be seen running towards it from the
shelter of the derelict carriages – the spell caster! Missiles were useless, as he was soon in a
crowd of regular passengers, but Sally sprinted along towards the train, and
saw him getting into an otherwise empty compartment. As the train passed them, the others could
see a large lynx clinging to the roof, then sliding
down towards the compartment door.
No-one else seemed to be taking much notice – there was still residual
‘ignore everything’ spell around the station area!
When they had finished the mopping up part of the operation,
Magda said that
the two female vampires had been neither Tanya or Rosa, but had been magically
altered to look like them, and also both Tanya and Rosa’s attributes had been
stolen from their souls to give to the two fakes, hence the anguish that she
and the girls had heard. She cast a
divination spell, and said that both Tanya and
The potions had obviously still been of some use, as Jack’s
neck wound was visibly healing as they got him to a car, and did not look as
though it had caused any permanent nerve damage, even though by rights it
should have killed him. Jocasta had also
been wounded, and this was healing in front of their eyes, as were the minor
cuts and bruises the others had sustained.
The fact that the minor cuts and bruises were visible more than 30
seconds after they were inflicted implied that the potions were losing potency
however. Any left after this would
probably be unusable.
As they got into their cars Jocasta’s mobile rang. Sally wanted picking up from Goatland, a
village just a little way down the line.
When they arrived there, Sally was wearing the beige raincoat, and was
holding a mobile that didn’t look like her own one – but then there aren’t any
pockets in fur. Ross was heard to mutter
to Roxy and the other teenagers ‘Take the last train to Goatland, and I’ll eat
you at the station!’ although
quite where he had heard the original no-one knows!
Chapter 21.
(In which Jocasta looks at the world from a new view-point.)
A week and a half passed.
Jack’s neck wound was healing well, but he was not his usual self. He seemed to have shrunk into himself, and
couldn’t look anyone in the eye. He was
avoiding Jocasta all together, but this wasn’t that difficult, as she was
making no real effort to be with him either.
Something was seriously wrong.
(See fic Fragile Thing)
Before anyone had been able to do anything about Jack,
Jocasta had a most unusual experience.
It was about four in the afternoon on Wednesday, Roxy was ‘working’ at
Jocasta’s shop, and Donna and Louise were there too, continuing with their
lessons with Magda, when a group of West Indians, all male apart from one
teenaged girl, entered the shop. One of
the men walked up to Jocasta, addressed her by name, introduced himself as
Elijah and complained that he had been led to believe that this shop sold real
spell ingredients, and real magic, but all he could see were trinkets and
powerless things. Then suddenly he
demanded that Jocasta make Roxy give up what was rightfully Ruth’s – indicating
the teenage girl who accompanied him. He
insisted that Roxy should just give up her Slayer powers to ‘his’ girl, and
when Jocasta tried to explain that this was simply not possible, there was no
point in him asking, he told her that nothing was impossible, there was no
reason why Ruth couldn’t have the Slayer powers, they could, and should, be
transferred to her NOW.
When both Jocasta and Roxy tried again to argue, Elijah
started to chant, and suddenly Jocasta was no longer looking at her shop full
of people, but over a calm sunny seascape, from a low level on a beach. At the same time Roxy, Magda and her pupils,
who had come into the back of the shop, noticed Jocasta’s eyes glaze over, then
she suddenly developed a French Caribbean accent, and was demanding that they
bring her rum, salt and corn! Magda
recognized that something had magically taken over Jocasta’s body (although the
others could probably have guessed this!) and drawing extra power from Donna
and Louise she managed to return the Voodoo Loa to it’s original host, and
Jocasta to her own body after what seemed like hours, but was probably only a
couple of minutes. Long enough for
Jocasta to have been pretty stunned to find herself transformed into a large
turtle sunning itself in the
Threatening that that had only been a taste of what he could
achieve, Elijah and his party swept out of the shop, promising that they would
be back.
That evening Jocasta made an effort to corner Jack in his
hotel room, and they began to sort things out.
Jack felt that he had let everyone down at Grosmont by letting someone
who looked like
(See fic Bookends)
Jocasta recognized that this depressed state would make him
more vulnerable to The First and was exactly what The First intended – she
realised that by producing ‘Tanya’ and ‘Rosa’ it had played on Jack’s sense of
chivalry. She was also carrying her own
burden of guilt – she had ignored the dying Jack, her lover, in favour of
helping Roxy, her Slayer – surely not a very human reaction? Surely Jack must have noticed and resent
it? She had even thought that it might
be part of why he was avoiding her, until it became obvious that he was
avoiding everyone. Talking into the
night, they began to sort things out, and the recognition of their own
vulnerabilities helped them both steady themselves ready for whatever challenge
Elijah might bring next.
There was no sign of Elijah next day and, on asking around,
someone discovered that his group had bought train tickets to
By
Then Elijah produced two dolls from his pocket, one dressed
as Ruth, the other with dark hair streaked with blue and green, carrying a
little stake – a Roxy voodoo doll! He
began to chant, holding the Roxy doll with her hands above her head, and
suddenly Roxy was in the same position, motionless although obviously
struggling to move. Just as Elijah
started to gesture from one doll to the other, general mayhem broke out, as
Magda, with Donna and Louise tried to counteract Elijah’s spell, and Jenny
managed to snatch the two dolls, as everyone else attacked. She passed the Roxy doll to Roxy herself –
probably the best person to have it she thought, as Roxettes and what turned
out to be mainly very big zombies tussled all around the shop and spilled out
into the street.
Jenny realised that she still had the Ruth doll, and as
Ruth, obviously a genuine Potential, fought with Grace, she threw it across the
shop to Jocasta. Ruth was suddenly flung
bodily into the air, and landed on the floor at the other side of the
shop. Jocasta grabbed the doll out of
the air, and wedged it, arms at its sides, in a draw behind the counter, and
Ruth took no further part in the fight.
Elijah’s minions were very tough to beat,
no matter how hard they were hit they kept on coming, even with bits hanging
off. Gabriella shooting them in the head
seemed effective, lopping bits off them slowed them down, and Jack had managed
to render one of the six foot odd tall non-zombies unconscious. Even though some of Elijah’s entourage had
dolls of some of the Roxettes, causing various people to be suddenly ‘held’ out
of the fight until someone else found the doll holder and took the doll off them,
it looked as if the Roxettes were gaining ground, when Elijah started to chant
again. Magda recognised that he was inviting
his Loa into himself, but was not able to actually stop him, neither were Roxy
and Teresa, who were trying to attack him themselves, and he suddenly roared,
and threw them both soaring through the air.
However, Jocasta, bemoaning the damage to her shop yet again,
and firing crossbow bolts into zombies, noticed a look of surprise cross
Elijah’s face. Magda also noticed it,
and as Elijah started to do some serious damage to all around him, and tried to
regain the Roxy doll, it became more obvious that he was trying to stop himself
doing these things, and was looking beseechingly at Jocasta, and further back
to Magda and her girls. As they were
trying to cast a spell to restore everything to it’s
natural place, he seemed to be trying to join in with THEIR chant, but then
kept making strangled noises and choking – talk about inner turmoil as Roxy
said later!
Despite what seemed to be his own best efforts, he had just
got hold of the Roxy doll, when Magda, Donna and Louise suddenly felt a rush,
as if they had been pushing against a wall and it had suddenly given way, and
the roar from Elijah’s mouth suddenly became a strangled wail, and then faded
away. He yelled, in his own voice ‘Stop,
stop, no more fighting!’ and everything slowly stilled.
When Elijah had opened himself for his own god or Loa to
take over his body, something else had – The First! Elijah had recognised it happening, and
although it gave him immense power to fight, he had no control, and felt that
its wishes did not really coincide with his own, which was why he seemed to be
trying to help Magda and the girls counteract his own spell. Something else odd had happened moments before
The First had left him – Grace, Manuelita, Louise, Donna, Ross and even Jack
had felt a sudden rush of power, which Ruth agreed she had also felt.
Jocasta, James and Sam recognised what they described – they
were suddenly ALL Slayers – although Donna, Ross and Jack found the effect only
lasted whilst they wore their rings.
What on earth was going on? Elijah
just wanted to get away – he had been shaken by what had happened and, anyway,
he seemed to HAVE his own Slayer by now.
Jocasta, as Senior Watcher, could not stop Ruth going with him, but was
fairly sure that he was probably intending to use Ruth to strengthen his own
position back home in
It was some hours before the Roxettes could begin to piece
together what had happened, when they finally got Buffy on her mobile, having
seen a very disturbing piece of footage on the news about Sunnydale disappearing
into a very large hole in the ground. As
Buffy, Faith and the Sunnydale Potentials had been battling Ubervamps, The
First had staged an attack, via Elijah, on the
(See fic Fight for the Right to Party – “Chosen”
from the point of view of Harmony Kendall!)
To the great sorrow of Jocasta (who had rather taken a liking to him)
and Teresa, and to the (only slightly less) sorrow of Roxy, James, and
Manuelita, the power of the amulet had been channelled through Spike, and then
the Hellmouth had closed around him – the only logical conclusion was that
Spike had perished saving the world.
There was something of a sense of end of term about the
Roxettes that weekend – even though some of them were in the middle of AS level
exams! Jocasta, James, and Sam sat up
late into the night, trying to make plans for the Watchers Council now that
there were so many Slayers to look after.
(See fic The Greatest
Flame – Epilogue, rating NC-17,
and also see fic Poppa Don't
Preach, second Epilogue)
BUFFY
THE VAMPIRE SLAYER ©2002 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All Rights Reserved. The Buffy the Vampire Slayer trademark is
used without express permission from Fox.