Buffy the Vampire Slayer - Buffy Season4 02

by The Lost Slayer 02 Dark Times # Christopher Golden

  Tendrils of ice spread throughout her body, wrapping around her spine and curling up in her gut. Grim-faced, she went to the police car and slid into the driver’s seat. As she put it in gear she caught sight of her reflection in the rearview mirror.

  A shock ran through her.

  For just a moment, she saw herself at nineteen. Then the illusion faded and she saw the way she truly looked, the hard line of her jaw, the ragged cut of her long, blond hair, the crinkles at the corners of her eyes and mouth, the furious glare of her eyes. It was startling, after so long, to see her own reflection. She saw that it was not only the world they had changed, but her as well. Buffy hated them all the more for it.

  In her mind, she saw again the image of herself at nineteen. That was how it was supposed to be. None of this was meant to happen. For a short while, she had almost forgotten that. Yet again the voice of her younger self rose up within her, took control.

  I’ve got to get back. I’ve got to fix this.

  The words meant so many things. Whatever was happening in the here and now, she had to do something about it, true. But that was the older Buffy’s priority. Within her body was also a girl out of time, a college girl who only ever wanted to be normal. A young woman who had been told by a ghost that she would make a mistake that would have catastrophic results. She could not help but think that she lived amongst those results even now.

  I have to go back, she thought again. Figure out what I did wrong, find a way back, and stop it. It never occurred to her to wonder if such a thing were possible. After all, the being called The Prophet had somehow cast the spirit of her younger self forward to inhabit her future body. If that was possible, there had to be a way to reverse the process.

  For the moment, though, she had to figure out just how far the vampires’ influence had spread, and stop them. It was what she did, who she was. The Slayer. Before The Prophet had touched her, had sent her forward in time, Buffy had been determined to dedicate herself wholly to being the Slayer, and also to having a life of her own. One hundred percent Slayer, one hundred percent Buffy. An impossible task, but she had done impossible things before. Yet that struggle had frustrated those close to her, and might have indirectly led to her current situation. If she had not made such a mess of things, she would never have been in a position to rely upon The Prophet, would never have ended up here. A grim smile cut through her melancholy now. For in this future she did not have to worry about trying to live two lives to their fullest, about filling two roles. The things that had made up the life of Buffy Summers seemed to have been torn away, leaving only this monstrous landscape where vampires ruled. No one needed Buffy anymore. She didn’t need to live two lives … only one. She was just the Slayer now. There was a freedom in that, and it felt good. Knuckles white where she gripped the steering wheel, she accelerated and raced out of El Suerte, headed for Sunnydale. Soon enough, they would know she had taken the car. Her only hope was that they would not realize where she was headed.

  Though she tried not to, Buffy wondered what had become of her mother and her friends, her old gang. Not only now, but then. Willow, Oz, Xander, and Anya. Not to mention Giles, and even Angel. What had happened to them that day, after The Prophet had cast her out of her body?

  In the past…

  It was difficult to breathe. Willow glanced around the dorm room she shared with Buffy, and shuddered. It was a pretty big room, but she felt claustrophobic in it for the first time. Oz sat beside her, and she reached out to squeeze his hand for reassurance. Xander and Anya were there as well. Quite a crowd for her little summoning, in the darkened room, with the shades pulled down. But even in the darkness, the thing that shimmered in the middle of the room, beside Buffy, was darker still. It made her think of black holes, the way it swirled, oily and black, there in the air, a rip in the fabric of the world.

  Willow had summoned Lucy Hanover, the ghost of a long-dead Slayer, who now aided lost souls in the afterworld. The ghost had heard dire predictions from this thing, called The Prophet, and had agreed to try to bring it forth to communicate those prophecies more precisely. But now that it was here, Willow only wanted to send the thing back. Just being in its presence made her skin crawl like nothing she had ever felt before. And now it seemed to float nearer to Buffy; or, perhaps more accurately, it seemed to consume the space between them, to slither across reality as it reached for her.

  No! Willow thought. Buffy, don’t let it near! But somehow she had lost the strength to cry out. The specter of Lucy Hanover lingered, hovering near the window, watching me proceedings as Buffy spoke to The Prophet. The entity’s words stunned them all.

  “The future cannot be prevented now. Already the clockwork grinds on,” it said, voice like whispered profanity. “But I can show you my vision, share with you the sight, so you may see what is coming and perhaps better prepare for it.”

  Buffy flinched away from it and glanced over at Willow. Silently, she urged the Slayer to say no. Anxiously, Willow bit her lip. The ghost of Lucy Hanover reached out phantom hands toward Buffy as though she wanted to help. But she was already dead. This was all the help she could offer. Buffy sat up straighter and stared at The Prophet, the flowing black presence in the room. “Show me.”

  Willow shook her head slowly, warning, but Buffy did not see. Still, somehow, she felt unable to speak.

  ” I must only touch you, and you may see.”

  “Do it,” Buffy instructed The Prophet.

  The Prophet’s slick, shimmering form slithered toward her. The tear in the fabric of the world extended toward her, fingers like tendrils reached for her.

  Finally, Willow felt something give way within her, as though the grip of some hideous force had finally loosened.

  “Buffy,” she said cautiously. “Maybe this isn’t such a good—” But it was too late. The Prophet touched Buffy. And Buffy screamed. The Slayer’s eyes went wide and she stared as though she were seeing a vision of unspeakable horror. Her mouth remained open but the ragged, high-pitched scream died on her lips. Her chest began to heave, and Buffy started to hyperventilate.

  “Buffy!” Willow cried.

  She ran to her best friend and grabbed hold just as Buffy began to fall limp. Angry, and fearful for her, Willow glanced around the room. Oz was beside her, Xander and Anya behind him, looking on worriedly.

  Otherwise the room was empty.

  “Where … where’d they go?” Willow asked softly.

  The others glanced around as well, apparently equally mystified.

  “That’s just like a disembodied clairvoyant,” Xander muttered. “Offer up the ominous future, then skip town before the questions start rolling in.”

  “I’m going to open the shade now. I’ve had enough darkness for today,” Anya said in clipped tones. When the shades were up, and the sunlight streamed in, Willow felt a little better. Buffy was still breathing, though her eyes were closed and she was pale. Her skin felt too cold. But she was alive. And she was the Slayer.

  “What do you think’s up?” Oz asked.

  Willow swallowed hard. “Well, I’m sorta hoping I’m wrong. And it bothers me to think about how often I feel that way. But I’m guessing whatever future that thing showed Buffy, it was too much for her to handle. Kinda think she’s in shock.”

  “Whoa. Red tight,” Xander said. “She’s the Slayer. How could just seeing something put her into a state of shock?”

  “I’m thinkin’ it depends what she saw,” Oz noted.

  Anya threw her hands up in exasperation. “See! Why does tins stuff always happen?” She rounded on Xander, a small pout on her lips. “Why do we live here? In all the world, this is where you want to live? Can’t we go far away from the impending apocalypse?”

  “You could,” Willow said sadly, still gazing at her best friend’s pale features. “But that wouldn’t keep it from coming.”

  For another few moments, Willow cradled Buffy gently in her arms. Then, with a suddenness that gave her a start, the S
layer opened her eyes. Her skin was still cold and white, but her eyes were as fierce and determined as always.

  Fierce and determined… and yet there was something else there as well.

  “Buffy!” Willow cried.

  “See!” Xander said. “She’s okay.”

  Buffy sat up and shook Willow’s hands off her. She stretched like a cat, as if testing her body to see if she was harmed in some way. Flexing her fingers, she stared at her hands as though they were some newly invented marvel. Then she stood up carefully, a bit off-balance. She nearly collapsed, and Willow thought of a foal just testing its legs for the first time.

  “You are okay, right?” Xander asked doubtfully.

  The Slayer glanced around the dorm room. A sly grin stole across her features for one moment, and then was gone. She went to the closet, reached inside and grabbed a black leather jacket, though it was too warm outside for the coat.

  “Buffy?” Willow asked. “Come on. I know you want to protect us, but we’re part of this. It’s our future, too. What did you see?”

  As she slipped the jacket on, Buffy turned to regard them all. There was no emotion on her face now.

  Her eyes flickered with some sort of light, as though from within.

  “Everything will be fine,” she said, a peculiar slurring to her voice.

  “You’re not all right,” Willow told her. “Come on. Just give yourself an hour’s rest. Then we’ll figure out what to do about Giles. You’ve got to talk to us, Buffy. Let us help.” But Buffy shook her head. “There is nothing you can do.”

  “So you’re going to go after Giles alone, after all this?” Xander demanded. He sounded ticked off, and Willow didn’t blame him.

  “Do not concern yourself,” Buffy said bluntly.

  With that, the Slayer turned and left the room, not even bothering to close the door behind her.

  “Great,” Xander sighed. “Now she’s back to that again. Omnipotent Slayer-girl. Taking it all on herself.”

  “I don’t know,” Willow said slowly, staring at the half-open door. Oz sidled up beside her. “What don’t you know?” he asked, brow furrowed.

  “I don’t think this is about that,” she said. “This is something else. Something new and family-size creepy. Or, okay, could be just Willow-paranoia. But I’m thinking The Prophet touching Buffy? Possibly more to it than just a Viewmaster of Doom.”

  “There was a sinister vibe around that thing,” Anya agreed. “But what do you think it did, exactly?” Willow stared at the door. “Remember the part where I said ‘I don’t know?’ “

  “Well, we’ll keep an eye on her. See what’s what,” Xander suggested. Willow nodded, deeply troubled, and afraid for Buffy. She didn’t know if the future was going to be as The Prophet had predicted, but she had a sinking feeling it was going to be ugly, one way or another. As she drove along nearly deserted roads, Buffy was chilled by the changes she saw around her. A few cars passed by, and some stores were open, but many others were boarded up. The skating rink just off I-17 had been partially destroyed by fire, and the parking lot was cracked and overgrown. There were no rollerbladers, no joggers, no bicyclists. Other than those few cars, the only people she saw were a pair of homeless men raiding a Dumpster behind a Chinese restaurant that was apparently still in operation, and they scrambled back through a broken fence behind the place when she drove by. Buffy decided it was perhaps best to enter the town quietly, perhaps even invisibly. They’d be looking for the car, after all. Buffy ditched the El Suerte police car in the overgrown lot that had once been the Sunnydale Twin Drive-in.

  It rolled across the cracked pavement, four-foot weeds whisking against the grille of the car. Buffy killed the engine, took a long breath, and laid her forehead upon the steering wheel for a moment. A slight motion, and she flinched at the sudden pain in her broken nose. Along with her other wounds, it had begun to heal quickly. That was part of being the Slayer. But it was still very sore. Resolute, she popped open the door and climbed out, then hesitated. Inside the police car was a shotgun locked in a brace between seats. It would be a simple thing to snap the brace and take it with her. Buffy glanced into the car and looked at the gleaming barrel of the gun. Then she shook her head. What she wanted was a crossbow. Maybe even a sword. But after all this time she suspected that the weapons caches at Giles’s apartment and her mother’s house, not to mention her dorm room back at U.C. Sunnydale, would have been cleaned out. Even if they were still there, the Kakchiquels, Camazotz’s vampire followers, would likely be keeping an eye on those places in case she should return. Without those weapons, without even a knife, she would have to fashion some crude, makeshift stakes, and hope that was enough.

  Buffy left the car where it was and began to walk back toward the road. After a moment she paused and glanced back at the concrete structure on the far side of the lot that had once served as both projection boom and concession stand. Once upon a time, like any abandoned structure in Sunnydale, it had been a prime nesting place for vampires and other creatures of darkness. Best to make sure, she thought.

  In a light jog, she crossed the lot without any attempt to hide herself. If anyone were inside the bunker-like edifice, they would already have seen her. The metal door was rusted and hung off its hinges. The sky above was blue as a robin’s egg, the wind whispered through the overgrown brush in the lot, the sunlight painted the world around her in bright hues. But the beauty of the day ended at that rusty door. The gaping maw of the place almost seemed to swallow the sunlight. Within was impenetrable darkness. Nothing moved inside.

  Buffy kicked the door loose and it crashed down onto concrete inside. She paused for a moment, then slipped into the dark. It took a moment for her eyes to adjust. Blinking, she ventured farther into the now gray, dusty interior of the building.

  Nothing. Something scuffled in the walls, but that was all. It was little more than a tomb for several generations of mice. There were counters of shattered glass where concession snacks had once been offered. Empty now.

  Head cocked to one side, Buffy listened, searching for some sound that did not represent rodents. Convinced she was alone, she turned to leave and then thought better of it. Upstairs in the projection booth she was likely to find furniture of some kind. And it was easier to turn smashed furniture into stakes than to forge them out of downed tree limbs, particularly when she had nothing to whittle with. Sure enough, at the top of the stairs, in the box of a room where the projectionist had once done his work, she found a small table and several wooden chairs, the legs of which would be satisfactory for her purposes. Buffy crossed to the table, pulled out the nearest chair, and froze with astonishment as she gazed at what lay upon it.

  A crossbow.

  More accurately, her crossbow, the one Giles had given her when they first began to train together. Beside it, a folded bone-white card with two words printed neatly on the front: For Buffy. Doubt flooded her and she glanced around anxiously, suddenly sure she must have been mistaken. Someone had to be here—otherwise how could she explain the weapon’s presence?

  Yet her senses confirmed it. She was alone.

  Tentatively, she reached out to pick up the crossbow, studying it intently to be sure there was no tripwire or other trap involved. There was not. Only the crossbow, and on the chair opposite that one, a small quiver containing bolts for it.

  Profoundly unnerved, a thousand questions in her head, Buffy shattered one of the chairs, snapped the legs and back into half a dozen usable stakes, and carried them under one arm with the quiver. In the other hand she held the crossbow. On alert, skin prickling as she searched around her for any sign of another presence, she hurried down the stairs and out into the sun. With the blue sky above, she felt a little better, but not much. This was a mystery that disturbed her deeply. Someone had known or at least suspected that she would find her way to this spot, or had been here upon her arrival and left these things for her to find.

  And all across the lot, the shadows cast by ne
arby trees and the remnants of the drive-in screens had grown longer. The afternoon was waning, and night was only a few hours away. Buffy hurried to the police car again. She opened the trunk, and was relieved to find a canvas bag that had belonged to one of the police officers inside. There were cotton sweatpants and a sweatshirt in there, as well as a large pair of sneakers. She dumped the clothes out, dropped the weapons into the bag, then noticed a small box of roadside flares and took those as well. She slung the bag over her shoulder and headed, not for the road, but for the chain link fence at the far side of the lot. It felt to her as though there were eyes upon her, now. The crossbow was almost warm in her grip. Buffy vaulted the fence and set off through a stretch of woods that would lead up to a power plant, from which she could work her way eventually into Hammersmith Park, and then into the backyards of residential Sunnydale.

  Stay off the street, she told herself.

  Chapter 3

  If the silence in El Suerte had been surreal, the ravaged streets of Sunnydale were all too real. As Buffy made her way through back alleys and across fire escapes, hugging the shadows to keep out of plain sight, a constant current of alarm and abhorrence ran through her body. Her town had become an abomination.

  The parks were ravaged, statues destroyed. Every few blocks she passed a row of buildings or houses that had been burned out completely, leaving a charred shell behind. It was unnerving, seeing some shops and markets apparently thriving, while so many other businesses had been ransacked, shattered windows in the front a sure sign of what she would find inside. Three times she had entered such a store, and each time the result was the same. Christabel’s Consignments, The Flower Cart, and Quarryhouse Pizza. Each store had been torn apart, ripped and shattered, but it had obviously happened long ago and a thick layer of dust, unblemished by the footprint of a single intruder, lay upon everything. In the back of each of those businesses, Buffy discovered the remains of the owners, so decayed that there was no way to tell how they died. She could only assume the vampires had killed them.