Again, Fetching Mad Scientist has my deepest gratitude for her insight and her patience-- a wonderful Beta ♥

Also this chapter is dedicated to Firefreezes for asking me to be her beta and getting me excited about writing again and helping to kick my own muse into gear ♥




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All of us are travelers lost,
our tickets arranged at a cost
unknown but beyond our means.
This odd itinerary of scenes
--enigmatic, strange, unreal--
leaves us unsure how to feel.
No postmortem journey is rife
with more mystery than life.

--The Book of Counted Sorrows

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So loud! So bloody loud. Why isn’t she moving?

Buffy… wake up, Luv. Sit up and open those beautiful eyes and let me see that green fire blazing at me.

Come on, come on! Get off your knees! You’re reverting to Nancy-boy William. Stand up you pathetic Git! Go help the girl!

What in the bleeding hell is that roaring sound…and that pounding? So much pounding!

Blood. I smell blood. Sweet. Tinged with fear.

It’s the demon bint’s.

More blood. Strong… metallic… whose?!? The Whelp? No. No, not his.

So much blood, smells mixing in my nostrils, so much… so much. I feel sick.

Wait! There! Spicy… strong… Buffy! She is bleeding. I-I don’t see any wounds… I don’t see…

Why are they all just standing there? Someone move! Go! Watcher don’t just stand there like a ponce! Help her dammit! HELP HER!!

God! So loud! I can’t hear! Heartbeats. All of their heartbeats… so many heartbeats throbbing, throbbing, pounding in my ears…

Why can’t I hear hers?

Buffy? Buffyyy! Oh God! No! No no no no no! Please!

Buffy?


And with that, the anguished vampire gave in to the violent tears threatening to overwhelm him.



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I want to go home. Buffy can we go home? I’m so tired and my stomach hurts… Buffy? Why are there so many stairs? Stupid hobbit demons!

I can do this. Why is everything moving so slowly? God, my stomach hurts!

Buffy. Have to get to Buffy.

Why do these stairs feel so hot? Where did I leave my shoes? My feet are burning. Buffy is going to kill me if I lose her shoes.

Buffy? Where are you? Please be ok. I’m coming Buffy. It’s over now. The portal-thing is closed. You did it Buffy! You beat the hell-bitch. We can go home now.

It’s cold. Why am I so cold? And tired. God, I just want to sleep for a week. I’m so tired.

Keep going. Almost to the bottom. There’s Giles.

Why is everyone just standing around? What are they looking at?

Buffy? Oh no, oh no! Buffy. Buffy!

Help her! Stop standing there and go help her! Why isn’t anyone helping her? Why isn’t she moving? Dammit, go help her! Why aren’t any of you helping her?!?

Buffy!


Standing on the next to the last step, Dawn stood there quietly, the roaring of the blood in her ears fading to a dull din as her heart shattered loudly inside her chest.



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Aaaaauuuuuuuuuuuuuuugh! Ah ah ah! Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaugh!”

The wailing seemed to snap everyone out of their stunned silence. The escapees from the hospital’s mental ward were milling about, some of them listless, quietly muttering to themselves while others sat and rocked themselves frenetically, wailing as if they were experiencing pain so severe that their entire bodies released the hurt through their vocal chords.

Giles was the first to react. Moving forward, he dropped to his knees next to his unmoving Slayer, reaching a hand towards her neck, pausing unsuredly before pushing aside her hair to press his fingertips to the spot where her pulse-point should have been throbbing with life and the strength of her beating heart. Instead it was still beneath his fingers. Falling backwards onto his butt, Rupert Giles sat there, his anguished silence finally giving way to the breathless sobs threatening to choke him.

Unable to tear his eyes away from the still form of one of his closest friends… his hero… Xander staggered, the weight of Anya in his arms almost too much and he struggled to remain upright; tightening his arms even tighter around her shaking form as his vision twisted sideways. Stumbling back a few steps, he backed into a large wooden spool of cable which threw his already tremulous balance off even further and he fell backwards, sitting hard on its top, hugging Anya so tightly she coughed a little in protest. Glancing dazedly at her upturned face, he loosened his hold on her, but just a little bit and when tears filled her expressive brown eyes, his own dark ones answered with tears of his own, the cries and screams of the insane people still walking aimlessly about, going unacknowledged by the six rag-tag warriors gathered around the petite body of their leader.

“Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!”

Dawn’s shout cleaved the fog that seemed to have settled over everyone and 6 pairs of crying eyes turned to her as she stood wavering on the steps, her right arm folded tightly over her still oozing stomach.

“Dawnie.” Tara hugged Willow close with one arm and held the other out to the teen, beckoning silently and when she moved forward, her foot seemed to find nothing but air and she tumbled down the remaining two steps, landing hard on her knees.

“Dawn!”

“Dawn!

Both Giles and Willow lurched forward, moving towards the young girl as she stared straight ahead at the prone form of her sister lying on top of splintered wooden crates and bags of powdered cement, the pain of her cut stomach and skinned knees forgotten as reality landed a crushing blow to her heart. Buffy…her sister…was dead and the roaring in hear head intensified to deafening proportions once more.

Higher the sun rose, un-noticed by everyone, including the sobbing blonde vampire until the hand he braced on the ground to push himself upright smouldered and he looked it for a moment as smoke seemed to rise off of his fingers and slowly he lifted them to his face, his watery blue eyes seeming confused.

“We have to go.” Anya’s unusually quiet voice stood out over the moans and cries of the people around them.

“The sun is coming up. People will be going to work soon and most likely the authorities will be notified with all of the crazy people walking around. We have to go,” she continued in the same sensible, subdued voice, wincing at the throbbing that seemed to radiate through her face from the top of her head.

Willow and Tara gathered around Dawn, hugging her and murmuring soothing, nonsensical words through their tears. Giles turned back to Buffy, rolling to stand on his knees, ignoring the pain that twisted his features into a grimace and he slid his arms beneath the knees and the neck of his Slayer, preparing to lift her into his arms.

“No! No, bring her to me.”

Looking over his shoulder at the bloodied vampire behind him in the shadows away from the sunlight, Giles said simply, “The sun.”

“We have to go through the tunnels so we can avoid being seen by others,” Xander replied quietly.

“Bring her to me Watcher… please.”

Nodding once, Giles lifted the slight girl in his arms, standing with difficulty as he turned to the now upright vampire waiting in the shadows. Walking slowly towards him, Giles reached out, offering the limp form huddled in his arms to the outstretched ones of the much stronger man in front of him. Gathering Buffy close to him, Spike cocked his elbow a bit so that her head was supported and he hugged her tightly to his chest, his tears starting anew. Staring at the unblemished face of the young girl he had come to love like a daughter, Buffy's features were softened as if she were simply sleeping and Giles felt his breath hitch in his throat as more tears threatened with that horrible deception.

“Giles? C-can you help us?” Tara’s voice reached out to him softly and the aging shopkeeper turned, noticing their struggle with the unresponsive teenager. Stepping close, he kneeled down, raising a hand to brush her hair out of her face, her glazed blue eyes still staring at her sister.

“Dawn? Dawn, look at me please.” Taking her shoulders gently in his large hands, Giles turned the traumatized girl towards him.

“Dawn? Dawn please… look at me.”

Still not responding, Giles took a deep breath, squeezing her shoulders gently and slowly her eyes moved sideways until she was looking into the gunmetal grey ones of her mentor.

“We have to go now Dawn. Can you walk?”

Blue eyes gazed at him flatly, as if her mind went the way of the ones of those left milling about. Reaching down, Giles took her arms, lifting them to encircle his neck as he scooped the long-limbed teenager into his arms.

Standing upright, he turned to follow the aggrieved procession of people walking quietly through the shadows to the drop-off where the drains emptied any overflow. It was dry now, the earth kicking up dust around their feet as they walked, heading straight for the opening that the city used to park their single utility truck and where the large control room was located that housed the controls for all the streetlights and lamplights around the city.

Two by two, the couplets strode deeper into the sewers as deep within their broken hearts, a dark river of blood flowed leaving each to feel as if he or she were bleeding out as slowly as their shuffling footsteps carrying them towards the house on Revello Drive.



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Standing beneath the manhole cover in the alley behind the Summers' house, the unique octuplets stood staring up at the circular steel cover as if all the world’s secrets would be revealed on its grungy surface. None of them were strong enough to lift Buffy up and out of the sewer and the only one that could was hampered with the last of the blazing peach burning away into the buttery, golden yellow of morning.

“Willow, Tara, is the canopy we used from…” Giles paused uncomfortably, taking a breath and swallowing hard before continuing. “…from Joyce’s wake still in the, ah, basement?”

Looking at each other questioningly, the Wiccans’ faces were marred in uncertainty.

“I-I don’t know. I mean, I’ve not really looked at any of the stuff down there and we didn’t move anything around…” Willow replied in a hesitant voice.

“We’ve only really gone down into the basement t-to do laundry,” Tara finished for her.

“There’s a large bookshelf off to the side of the washer. Its folded up and leaning next to it,” Spike offered quietly, his accented voice sounding rough even to his own ears.

“Yes, ok then. We will go up to the house and Xander and I will bring it out.” Turning to look at the young man who still looked more than shell-shocked, Giles called his name. “Xander?”

Blinking, Xander looked away from the manhole cover and nodded silently.

“Right then. Let’s go.”

Setting Dawn down gently on her feet, Willow and Tara gathered her in the circle of their arms once more as Giles reached up, pushing and then sliding the cover out of the way. Looking around for something to stand on, he was surprised for a moment when he turned to find Xander with legs spread apart, slightly bent over with his hands hanging down towards his knees, fingers laced tightly together.

“Right. Thank you.”

Bracing his hands on the younger man’s shoulders, Giles tentatively placed one foot into the cup of Xander’s hands and bounced lightly on his other foot once, twice, heaving himself up on the third bounce, lifting his arms to brace himself on either side of the ground around the opening. Xander moved beneath the dangling legs to grips the soles of the Watcher’s shoes, pushing him up even higher as he lifted himself out of the sewer before swinging his legs around so that he could lie on his stomach. Shifting a bit so that he was comfortable and steady, he reached an arm back down inside.

“Give me Dawn first and then the girls and then you come up after them Xander. We’ll come back for you a-and… we’ll come back with the canopy for you Spike”

Carefully they bounced, stretched, lifted up and out of the sewer below, the four girls and then Xander; the somber mood settling even more heavily as they were elevated out of the shadowy darkness into sunlight that seemed too bright.

Sitting with Buffy still held in his arms, Spike leaned back against the concrete wall, his bright blue eyes studying the beautiful face of the woman that he loved, speaking in whispering tones.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry Buffy.”

And with the words came more tears. He was surprised that he hadn’t withered yet with the buckets of salt he lost in the past hour and a half and he gathered her close to him, burying his face into her neck as he wept, her body cooling in death and he cried all the harder for it, his voice breaking over the words he whispered like a litany into her hair.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry Buffy. I’m so sorry…”