Chapter 8 : A white rabbit?


“Buffy! I did it! I opened the portal. Wow! It‘s amazing. Like a picture from a Tolkien book.” Willow was craning her neck to look between Anya and Buffy, almost pushing Spike out of the way.

“Excuse me, I think the words “we did it” would be more appropriate,” said Anya with a distinct sniff.

“Oh, right, yes, we did it,” Willow said absentmindedly. She went to step outside the door into the forest that spread before them, then squeaked as Buffy grabbed her arm and pulled her back, closing the door with a thud.

“Will, wait a second. Let’s think this through before we become all action girls.”

“Buffy, it’s the other dimension, the one where Spike’s sister was sent.”

“OK, say it is, what exactly are we planning on doing next?”

“Find Hope,” Spike said, reaching for the door handle, eyes blazing.

“Spike, wait, please.”

“Buffy you seem almost anxious that we don’t find Hope,” Arabella broke in, her voice trembling with bewilderment.

Buffy took a deep breath. She refused to lose her temper with Spike’s cousin: she knew the vampire girl was waiting for her to do just that. Shout, yell, make a scene, even try to stake her. Inch by inch she was pushing her along that path and with a cold sinking feeling, Buffy realised that she would lose Spike completely if that happened. In this war she was being out thought and out guessed. But from now on she would be on her guard.

“I’m anxious that we have a plan before we go out there. And even more anxious that we know how to get Sunnydale back!” She struggled to keep her voice even, and realised by the changing expressions on Spike’s face that her words were at last getting through.

“Red, can you get us back?”

Willow glanced at Anya who shrugged and sat down at the table. Different dimensions were no big deal to her. Seen one seen them all, she thought. They were never that exciting; usually boring, like the shrimp world or dangerous in an icky sort of way with body parts strewn everywhere and constant storms, like this one.

Willow frowned. “I think all I need to do is reverse the spell,” she said slowly. “And we’ve still got the ingredients we need here in the shop. So yes, we can get home, Buffy. Now can we please explore?”

Buffy gave in. “OK, but try and keep the door of The Magic Box within view at all times. And stay together.”

Spike was already opening the door and stepping out into the shadowy forest glade. A big pink bird swooped down, shrieking cheerfully at the intruder, then flew away to sit on a branch, chattering curiously. Two chipmunk type creatures skittered away playfully from beneath his feet.

Arabella followed him, Buffy and Willow a step behind. Buffy turned to Anya was still standing in the doorway. The rest of the shop was invisible; the door appearing to hang in thin air. “Are you coming out?”

The ex-demon shook her head. “There’s nothing interesting and it looks like rain. You’ll all get soaked and I’ve got my best jeans on. I’m going to do some stocktaking instead. Much more sensible use of my time.”

Buffy grinned. It didn’t look in the slightest bit like rain. Anya was so adept at doing exactly what she wanted. “OK. Keep the door shut. We don’t know who or what else is living here.”

She turned to find that Willow was already a hundred yards away, wandering along, gazing up at the canopy of green leaves that wove a dense ceiling above their heads. “Don’t go too far!” she called, beginning to feel like a schoolmistress on an outing instead of the Slayer on a mission.

Spike glanced at her. “Not quite what I expected,” he said. “How can we tell which way to search? It all looks the sodding same.”

Arabella was sitting on a fallen log, and to Buffy’s delight – she seemed irritated. She was rubbing dirt off her shoes, looking as if she’d be only too glad to take them off and throw them away. But when she realised Buffy was glancing in her direction, her expression changed to one of concern. “William, it was a very long time ago. Things will have changed. Perhaps it didn’t look like this when Darla sent Hope through the portal.”

Buffy sensed a flare of pain from the vampire. She wanted to say something kind, something to make him feel better, but he didn’t seem to want sympathy from her. He was getting enough of that from his cousin. She bit her lip. Well, if he wouldn’t take sympathy, perhaps he’d take the one thing she could give him – help.

“Spike – you’ve got the locket, haven’t you?”

He looked at question at her, but slid the heavy silver carved necklet out of his pocket. “Do you reckon this is going to be of some use now?”

Buffy shrugged. “I have no idea. But it opened the portal, didn’t it? And Darla obviously felt it was vitally important. There must be lots of other ways of opening a doorway to this dimension, so maybe the locket has some other use as well.”

She stared round at the waving green leaves, the dappled shade, little butterflies like gems flicking and fluttering in a gentle breeze. Even as she looked, a small, Bambi type deer peeked from behind a bush and tiptoed across the path in front of them.

“God this place!” Spike’s face softened. “It’s like some Walt Disney film. At least if Hope’s been living here, she’s had a lovely world to exist in.”

Arabella stared around, her beautiful face set with the blank expression Buffy was beginning to recognise. She didn’t agree with her cousin in the slightest. She obviously thought this world was awful, but wild horses wouldn’t have made her disagree with Spike.

Arabella leant over and picked the locket out of his palm. Buffy started forward, then held herself in check. Now was not the time to intervene. Not when they hadn’t found a single clue to Hope’s existence.

Arabella held the locket out at arms’ length, watching as it swung to and fro on the end of the heavy silver chain. Then she began to make little circles in the air with it and Buffy had the oddest sensation that Spike’s cousin knew exactly what she was doing. That she had, in fact, done all this before.

She blinked and started. For a wild instant, the green forest before her had vanished and a dark, desolate, rock strewn wilderness took its place. Then it, too, vanished, and the deep emerald forest returned, birds singing, little animals scurrying around, a big rabbit standing on its hind legs and –

Buffy rubbed her eyes and the wilderness flashed back and away. But this time she knew something was very wrong. The rabbit was wearing a blue coat and looking at a watch!

“Spike!” she whispered, “can you see that rabbit?” And even as she spoke, it vanished.

“What the bloody hell!” Spike spun round in game face, his eyes flashing gold. “Buffy! Bella! Watch out, there‘s a panther behind that bush. I saw it move. This place isn’t as harmless as it looks.”

Arabella stopped swinging the locket. “Harmless? I don’t know how you ever thought it was, William. Look at all the rats and snakes slithering about. I just feel so sorry for poor Hope. How could Darla have done that to a little child?”

“Bella, what the heck are you talking about? There aren’t any snakes and rats. Just a bloody big panther thing. Can’t you hear it growling? Buffy, call Willow back before it hunts her down.”

Buffy stared around her. There were far more birds and butterflies now. Fluttering, swirling, every colour of the rainbow. More Bambis and OK – that was it! A black and white cat with frenzied eyes chased a yellow bird across the grass towards her.

She snatched the locket out of Arabella’s startled hand and shoved it deep into her jeans’ pocket. “Spike, Arabella. Tell me, what exactly do you see?”

Spike flared back into human form. “The panther’s gone. That was bloody weird, Slayer. It looked just like the one out of The Jungle Book.”

Buffy nodded slowly. “And I’ve just seen Bambi, The White Rabbit and half the cartoons I used to watch when I was a child.”

Arabella jumped up. She‘d taken off her fake glasses and pulled her brown curls loose from their tight clips. “You’re both mad. The place is a mess of old boxes and rubbish, rats and mice and snakes.”

“No, it isn’t,” Buffy said slowly. “I think it’s far worse than that. When you were swinging the locket, I got a glimpse. It’s a hellish place. But something, someone wants us to see it differently.”

“It’s using our memories,” Spike said quietly. “Shape shifting the environment. Like an Orderna demon does to lull its prey, to make it stand still.”

Buffy nodded. “We all see something different. Willow said it looked like a page out of Tolkien when she first opened the door. Anya thought it was going to rain. To me it looks like Disney. You think it looks like The Jungle Book and Arabella – ”

She cast a quick look at the vampire girl and, for a second, a quick flash of pity stabbed her. Rats and snakes, filth and dirt, what had happened in Arabella’s life for that memory to be used so easily?

“Who’s doing it to us?” Spike said angrily “There’s no one here, Slayer. The only other human I can sense at all is Willow wandering around.”

The despair in his voice burnt in her brain. The chance of finding his half sister had seemed so real a few hours ago. Now it seemed hopeless. How could a little Victorian girl have survived if she’d been thrust through a portal into this shape-shifting dimension? Surely she would have died of shock if nothing else?

Buffy glanced at Arabella. There was an expression on the vampire’s face that she couldn’t quite work out. Smug? Satisfied? She had her hand on Spike’s shoulder, all cousinly concern, but Buffy had spent too much time in Cordelia’s company not to know when a girl was acting a part, vampire or not.

“Can you remember anything else Darla said?” she asked sharply.

Arabella shrugged. “Oh, Buffy, don’t think I haven’t tried and tried to recall that night in France. But it is such a long time ago. She was experimenting with magic for The Master, trying to see what would happen if you sent humans through different portals. She told me she had opened one with the locket and sent Hope through. William, I’m so sorry! I would give anything to find Hope for you.”

Spike sighed. “Not your fault, ‘Bella. No one’s fault. We are what we are, even Darla. Don’t feel guilty. It was a rotten secret to have to keep. And you’d been told I’d die if I tried to interfere.”

Buffy bit her lip hard. What the hell was the matter with Spike? Couldn’t he see this girl was playing him? All this rubbish about protecting him from himself. They’d all been vampires together, for heaven’s sake!

And she realised, too, that Arabella hadn’t actually answered her question directly. She still hadn’t come straight out and said that Darla had told her nothing else about how to find Hope.

“Arabella – ” Buffy began angrily, aware of Spike’s startled look as she took a step towards his cousin. And she felt a wave of desolation sweep over her as he automatically put a protecting hand on Arabella’s shoulder.

But just then there was an enormous commotion behind them. They spun round in time to see Xander leap from the Magic Box doorway, chased by a furious, growling, seven foot, emerald green Frovlax demon.

Div’vid had arrived to find his wife!


To be continued