full 3/4 1/2   skin light dark       
 
Something to Sing About by Lilachigh
 
Chp 14 Right or Wrong
 
<<     >>
 
Something to Sing About


Chp 14 Right or Wrong

“Willow! Xander! Faith, let him up! He’s a friend of mine. His name’s Xander!”

The heavily pregnant, dark-haired girl rolled clumsily off the body beneath her, wincing as the baby kicked, agitated by all the excitement. Buffy could see Willow’s eyes widen at the sight of the glowing green light showing under the robes the other Slayer was wearing.

“What the hell are you doing here? No, never mind. I’m just so pleased to see you both,” Buffy whispered and reached down to effortlessly lift Xander to his feet. “How did you get past the guards?”

Willow smiled weakly. “I’d forgotten just how much magic I can conjure up when I put my mind to it,” she said. “I made them fall asleep. I…I couldn’t kill them, Buffy. I wanted to!” She swayed where she stood, remembering Oz’s dead, twisted body. “Oh god, I wanted to so much! But I couldn’t. They’ll wake up soon.”

“We’d better not be here then, B,” Faith said.

“Who’s this?” Willow asked.

“Her name‘s Faith,” Buffy replied briefly, opening the door and peering out into the corridor. “She’s a Slayer. She’s the one having a baby. She’s carrying the Key, the thing Ben wants more than anything.”

Xander stared apprehensively at the pregnant girl. “Buffy, she can’t be. You’re not dead.” He reached out to pinch her arm. “You’re not, are you?”

Buffy felt her nerve endings rip in pain and knew that somewhere, Ben was torturing Spike. Nausea filled her throat and she battled it back. She had to get to him, rescue him, but first of all she had to get Faith to safety.

“I don‘t understand it, either, Xander. But here she is and she‘s carrying the Key baby that Ben needs to open his portal into another reality. This is what this whole thing has been about. He needs to get home.”

“ET phone home,” Xander muttered and then wished he hadn’t as the three girls glared at him.

“Tara’s keeping look-out on the stairway,” Willow said as they slipped out of the door into a long dark corridor. “I don’t know how long the guards will stay asleep, Buffy. We need to hurry.”

They reached a flight of step stones that twisted round out of sight. Buffy led the way, stepping cautiously over the snoring bodies of Ben’s guards who were lying everywhere. At the top of the stairs, Tara stood, her face very white, almost shaking with fear. She gasped with relief when she saw them all.

“Oh thank God, Xander, are you all right? Buffy?”

“We’re OK, Tara. What’s happening?”

“The g…guards are st…still asleep!” she gasped, reaching out for Xander’s hand. “But one or two of them are groaning and rolling about. They could wake up at any moment. I was so scared!”

Despite her unhappiness, Buffy smiled briefly. She knew only too well that to act when you were frightened was far braver than rushing into action when you weren’t scared of anything. She appreciated deeply what her friends in this world had done for her.

“Willow – Xander. Listen, take Faith and get the hell out of here,” she said tersely.

“B, you have to come too,” Faith gasped as pain rippled across her face. “Ben will kill you without thinking once he knows we’ve escaped.”

Buffy shook her head. “I’m not leaving Spike here,” she said softly glancing across at the vast wooden door that led to the Great Hall. She was certain that was where they were holding the vampire. Where they were torturing him, not for information or revenge, but just because it gave them a warped sense of amusement. “He wouldn’t leave me and I won’t abandon him.”

“But Buffy, how on earth are you going to rescue him?” Faith said. “Ben’s a god and you can’t seriously think you’re going to get the vampire away from him with the help of these three amateurs!”

Buffy stared at her in disgust. “Well, they’ve just saved us, Faith, so not such amateurs now. But don’t worry, I’m going in on my own.”

“Buffy!” Willow grasped her arm, her eyes dark with worry and fear. “Isn’t it more important to make sure Faith and her baby are safe? ”

Buffy hesitated, almost unable to bear the pain that was tearing through her mind. Leave Spike to his fate? Was that what she had to do to save this Sunnydale? In the other world, she had sacrificed herself and saved Dawn and she’d been prepared to do that this time, as well. But not Spike! Surely the man she loved didn’t have to die?

“Buffy! Some of these guys are waking up!” From under his brown hood, Xander’s voice was quaking, but he hadn’t moved and Buffy felt her heart go out to them. These weren’t fighters in this world; okay, Willow was a witch, but Tara and Xander were just ordinary people who happened to be her friends. And in that moment she knew she had to leave Spike. There was no way these three were going to be able to fight their way out of the hotel whilst protecting Faith.

A great coldness flooded over her. So she was as much the Slayer in this world as the other, she thought bitterly. Why had she ever thought it might be different? She’d been able to save Dawn before by sacrificing herself, but this time was different. Ben didn’t want her blood, he wanted an unborn infant, a Slayer’s child, but not hers.

And, she realised, fighting back the tears that threatened to blind her, if Spike died, she wouldn’t even have his child. She wasn’t pregnant; it was Faith who carried the Key baby, not her.

“OK, let’s move!” she snapped and half led, half carried Faith up another staircase, through a door and into the cold air. To her surprise, it was daylight outside, a dull, sullen day; no sun in the sky, just heavy grey clouds and a bitter cold breeze that blew dust in her face.

A hundred yards away from the hotel, she stopped and gazed back. All was quiet; no one seemed to have realised they were gone. Then, just as she turned away, she heard shouting and yelling and knew Ben had discovered his Key baby had vanished.

Buffy never remembered much of their race home. She knew she couldn’t have done it without Xander’s help. Grim faced, tight-lipped and obviously scared out of his mind, he still helped her support Faith and came up with the idea that they go back to Revello Drive, rather than Willow’s house.

“They know where Willow lives. They’ll think she’ll go straight home,” he said, panting as they hurried along the main Sunnydale road. “They don’t know about Revello. Ben was never interested in you, Buffy. He just wanted the baby this girl is carrying.”

Buffy nodded and, as if in a dream, efficiently hustled the group inside and slamming and locking the door behind her.

Faith collapsed onto the sofa, trying to catch her breath. She was now very pale and obviously in pain. Tara helped her swing her feet up and sat, stroking her long black hair as the contractions racked her body.

“Buffy, this baby is coming soon,” she said. “What shall we do?”

Buffy was staring blankly at the wall; her whole body was taut with anguish. Oh god, she’d left Spike behind. She’d had no choice, but it didn’t make the pain any better. Was he still alive? She searched her heart and knew he was. She would sense immediately if he’d been dusted. All she could sense was pain and more pain, but not death, not the emptiness in her soul that she knew she would feel if he’d gone from her.

She wondered what he was thinking now. He’d been quite clear when the monks had dragged him away. He’d wanted her to save the baby, to stop Ben getting his evil hands on the Key and plunge this universe into the chaos Glory had wanted for the other Sunnydale.

But she also knew he would believe in her. Some part of him would never admit that she would leave him to his fate. And he would be wrong.

She stared at Faith. The girl was obviously well along in labour now. The green glow was pulsing across her stomach in great ripples of colour. The Key baby was on its way.

“You can’t have the baby in this world,” Buffy said suddenly. “Ben will sense it. Know the Key has arrived. If you’re not here, if the Key isn’t in this world, then he’ll have to go. There’ll be no point in him staying around.”

Faith gazed up at her, dark eyes glazed but still intense. “Where will he go?”

Buffy shrugged and tied back the blonde hair that had escaped from its ponytail, pulling it back from her temples so hard that the skin stretched white under the strain. But she welcomed the pain. She wanted to feel something, anything, to share with Spike.

“I don’t care, as long as it’s away from here. I can’t kill him. But I can take away what he truly wants and needs. Your baby.”

“And where do you reckon I can go like this?” Faith gasped. “I don’t think I can even get in a car, B. And where would we drive? This baby is going to arrive within minutes. There’s no time to escape from Ben.”

Buffy walked across the kitchen and kicked over the bucket that still stood over the whirling orange and purple portal. She stood, staring down at it. “You come home with me,” she said quietly.

Willow shook her head. “Buffy, there’s already a Faith in your world.”

“And she’s a Slayer, like this one. And she’s in prison. I just need this Faith to have her baby in safety, then she can come back here.”

“What happens to the baby?” Tara asked softly.

Buffy looked down at Faith. “There isn‘t any choice. The baby will have to stay with us in the other Sunnydale. There is no way we can let the Key live in this world, if you want to save it from Ben.”

Faith struggled to her feet, reaching out to take Xander’s help as he heaved her upright. “OK, B. I can deal with that. It doesn’t seem like my baby, anyway. Just something I’m carrying for someone else. You want it, you can have it.”

Buffy laughed bitterly. “Oh, I don’t want your baby, Faith. I’ve got a sister who was a Key. I know what’s in store for the kid. But it can’t live here in this world. If you want to come back, you can, but the baby can’t.”

“Buffy – ” Willow was almost pleading. “Spike – ”

The Slayer spun round, her face blank of all emotion. “I can’t help Spike now, Will. There’s no choice. Perhaps there never was. Once this baby is safe, perhaps I can come back and – ”

She stopped abruptly. What was the use? Spike would be dead. And before he died, he would have known that she left him to his fate. Oh, he’d know why, even agree with what she was doing, but that wouldn‘t make any difference. At some level he would know she had abandoned him.

“Keep out of sight, Will. Ben will be hunting for Faith and the baby, but if there’s no trace of her, then he’ll eventually have to go.”

She hugged her friends briefly. There was no time for long goodbyes. Taking Faith by the hand, she gazed round just once at the dirty, shabby kitchen, so different to the one at home. Would she ever be back? What would be the point? She’d lost the man she loved more than life herself, but Slayer’s had to go on, however desperate they felt.

Coldly she pushed all her emotions and feelings into a corner of her brain and locked them away. She refused to think about Spike any more. It was too painful, too dangerous.

The portal beckoned, and with Faith at her side, Buffy stepped into it and the two of them vanished.

Tara was sobbing quietly in Xander’s arms. Willow sank onto the floor, head in hands. “She’s gone,” she said wearily. “And I don’t think we’ll ever see her again.”

“Do you think the Faith girl will return?” Xander asked.

Willow shrugged. “Yes, probably she will. She’ll have the baby, leave it with Buffy and come back to be our Slayer. Perhaps without the Key, she’ll find a way to deal with Ben – if he‘s still here.”

Xander moved the shutters slightly and peered out at the street. “I may be imagining it, but it seems a bit lighter out there,” he said, realising that for the first time in months, he didn’t want a drink. Which was way weird when you remembered exactly what he’d been through during the past few hours.

Tara wiped her eyes with her fingers and tried a smile. “Perhaps Buffy is right, then. If Ben can’t sense the Key in this world, then he won’t stay. He’ll go somewhere else.”

“Poor Buffy. Poor Spike,” Willow muttered. “What is she going to do without him?”

There was a long silence, then Tara said, “At least she’ll have the baby.”

“Oh yes, raising someone else’s kid, who isn’t really human but a mass of green energy, that’ll be fun for her. And every time she looks at it, she’ll know she sacrificed the man she loved for it to live.”

Tara shook her head, puzzled. “No, I don’t mean Faith’s baby! I mean hers and Spike’s.”

“Whoa! You mean Buffy’s having a baby, too!” Xander looked stunned.

Tara smiled for the first time in hours. “Oh yes. I don’t know why she’s keeping it a secret, except she’s only just started.”

Willow looked up at her sharply. “You mean another Key baby? She and Faith are both carrying green energy kids?”

Tara shook her head. “Oh no! Buffy’s carrying a perfectly normal child.”

To be continued












 
<<     >>