Her sister was standing at the end of the sidewalk, frozen, hands held out awkwardly from her sides.
Buffy reached her. “What’s the…oh. Oh, God.”
“Dear Lord,” Joyce gasped.
The girl couldn’t have been more than six. She appeared to be dressed in pink pajamas, but it was hard to be sure because she was ripped open from the base of her neck to her hips. Organs spilled out of the gaping would, but there was no blood to be seen.
“She was on her stomach,” Dawn said in an eerily calm voice. “I thought she tripped, so I went to help her. I turned her over, and she got on my hands. She got on my hands, shegotonmyhands….”
“We’ll go wash,” Joyce said firmly, maternal instinct snapping her out of her horror to focus on her youngest child. “We’ll go wash right now, and call the police.”
She turned Dawn away and led her to the house, leaving Buffy with the small body and the neighbors who were beginning to gather. The girl’s face hadn’t been disturbed. China-blue eyes stared sightlessly at the sky. One small arm was outstretched, the fingers pointing accusingly at Buffy.
She didn’t need to point. Buffy knew where the guilt lay. I didn’t wake up. This baby was killed right outside my house, and I didn’t even wake up. I have prophetic dreams all the time, and I didn’t see this coming.
Her legs suddenly refused to hold her, and she sank to her knees.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. But of course the little girl couldn’t forgive her. She was dead. Had died while the Slayer slept. Buffy wanted to pound her head into the sidewalk until the sight of the little body was driven out.
The sound of sirens made her blink, and she was able to finally turn her eyes away. The white cigarette butt was fresh and white against the grass. Moving like a sleepwalker, Buffy came to her feet again and walked over to where it lay.
“Don’t touch anything! That’s evidence” An officer was suddenly by her side.
She didn’t need to touch anything. Buffy had gotten close enough to see the butt clearly as she had seen so many others held in black-painted fingernails. Spike’s brand.
Searing guilt, pain and rage swamped Buffy, and she started to shake. All the times she could have killed Spike but had let him live ran through her brain, interspersed with the little girl’s face. Her fault, her fault. Oh, God, it was her fault this child was dead.
Vaguely, she heard the officer say something about asking her some questions. Buffy heard her voice answering him, but couldn’t have told anyone what she said. Her mind seemed trapped in a loop of horror.
The coolness of the Slayer washed over her and she sank into it with relief. Her mind reached an icy clarity that let her think again, let her give sensible answers to the police, and let her walk back inside her house so she could lose her breakfast in the toilet instead of out on the front lawn.
Buffy was greeted by a very subdued gang at the Magic Box. She had called Giles, and he had reached everyone else, although most of them knew what had happened from the papers.
“Your’re sure it was Spike?” Tara asked softly.
“His cigarette was there. And it can’t just be coincidence that she was…butchered…in front of my house.”
“He never did anything like this before,” Willow said. “Not even before the chip. And he didn’t kill me or Xander that first night. Why now?”
Buffy shook her head. “I don’t know. Maybe getting the chip out made him go crazy, but it just took awhile. Maybe he decided he hated me enough to not try and be careful anymore. Maybe it was the phase of the moon. I don’t know why he did it! He just did it!”
“Easy,” Giles said gently. “We’re all upset.”
“Sorry, Will,” Buffy said. The witch reached over and squeezed her hand. She took a deep breath, and slid into Slayer mode. “He’s challenging me. Calling me out. So, I’ll go out, and we’ll finish it.”
“Maybe we can help,” Willow said. “You know that demon-seeing spell?”
“The one I cast when I thought I was a demon,” Tara added sheepishly.
“Yeah.”
“We’ve tailored it to look for a specific demon. You basically do the demon-seeing spell and throw in a lot of stuff you know about the demon you want to find. I think we can use it to look for Spike since we both know him.”
She was burning with the need to be out tearing the town apart for the vampire, but if Willow’s idea worked, the search would be a lot shorter. Shorter was good. The quicker she dusted him, the better for everyone. If she could take him in daylight, so much the better. His escape routes would be limited.
“Can you do it now?”
Willow nodded and she Tara pushed away from the table. Giles flipped the sign on The Magic Box’s door to Closed to prevent interruption.
As the witches drew the protective circle and lit the candles, Buffy, Giles, and Xander moved out of the way to stand next to Anya who was watching interestedly from behind the counter.
Willow and Tara settled into the circle, and Willow took a street map of Sunnydale out of her pocket and spread it on the floor between them. Tara removed a pointed crystal from her neck and the witches joined hands so that both of them held the leather cord.
“We’re going to start by dowsing to get an idea of the general area where he is,” Willow explained. “Then we can narrow it down further.”
They both closed their eyes.
“Sisters of night
Daughters of Hecate
We petition and ask you
To reveal where evil lairs."
The overhead light was still on, but it seemed darker in The Magic Box, shadows piling up in the corners. Buffy frowned, rubbing her suddenly chilly arms.
“Show us the demon,
The vampire known as Spike.
Once called William the Bloody,
Sired by Drusilla.”
Buffy could feel power rising. The air crackled with ozone and the hair on her neck and arms standing up.
Anya had moved close to Xander and was staring anxiously around the room. “There’s something wrong,” the ex-demon stated flatly.
“Sisters of night,
Daughters of Hecate…"
Buffy looked over at Giles, who had removed his glasses.
“I agree,” he said. “Willow, Tara, you should stop….”
The map burst into flame and the crystal exploded, the blast knocking both witches out of the circle and momentarily blinding the others. Books shot off the shelves, and papers whirled around the store. Cold laughter echoed from the walls and ceiling.
“Are you guys ok?” Buffy asked, kneeling next to Tara, as Xander and Anya bent over Willow.
“Our hands,” Tara whimpered.
Buffy looked and winced. Willow's and Tara's left hands were red and blistered, shards of crystal protruding from the injured flesh.
Giles said, “We need to get them to a hospital.”
“Wait a second!” Buffy demanded even as they helped the injured girls to their feet. “What happened? What did that?” “
A shield,” Anya said in her brisk way. “Seriously powerful. I couldn’t do one that strong when I had my full demon powers.” She nodded professionally at Buffy. “That’s some strong magic you’ve got there.”
“Spike never did any magic that I know of,” Buffy said slowly.
“We thought he might be working with someone else,” Giles reminded her. “And magic would have been one way to remove or neutralize the chip.”
Oh, great. I can fight Spike and a wizard.
“I’m really sorry you guys got hurt. But did you get any idea of where he was?”
Tara managed to smile. “No, I’m sorry. Don’t worry about us.”
“Giles, will you take them to the hospital?” Buffy checked her stake supply, and began to rummage through the weapons cabinet.
“Where are you going?” Giles asked.
”To find him the old-fashioned way.”
In the end, Xander and Anya accompanied Buffy.
“I can’t do magic, but I can tell if it’s around,” the ex-demon explained. “If a building or something has wards, I’ll know.”
Xander refused to let them go without him, and volunteered to carry the gym bag full of extra weapons.
“Ok,” Buffy agreed. “But you stay out of any fights. I don’t want anybody else to get hurt.”
“Not a problem,” Anya said cheerfully.
They searched all the rest of the day, and into the night, pacing off a grid of Sunnydale. Deserted buildings, old warehouses, homes up for sale.
Buffy moved as one possessed, part of her inwardly snarling at the necessarily slower pace of the others. Xander and Anya tried to keep up, and Anya even refrained from complaining about her feet, but they simply weren’t able to move as swiftly as the Slayer.
Xander finally called a halt. “We need to eat,” he said firmly. “And take a break.”
“It’s night!” Buffy said angrily. “He could be out there killing some other little kid.”
“Yeah, and if we find him when we don’t have any energy we won’t be able to stop him.”
She fumed but knew she was right. Her stomach growled with hunger, her feet made their aching known…and the little girl suddenly seemed to stand before her, pointing an accusing hand. Her gorge rose. “You go,” she said. “We can meet up later.”
Xander put a hand on her shoulder. “Buff, I know you feel like it’s your fault...” Then, he frowned, moved his hand to her forehead. “Are you sick? You feel hot.”
Buffy twisted away. There was no time for this. “I’m fine,” she said levelly. “You go home, call it a night. I’ll see you later.”
“Buffy!”
But she was gone, running with preternatural speed into the shadows.
“What is going on with her?” Xander muttered.
Anya shook her head. “There’s magic all around her. Her aura’s weird.”
“Is someone attacking her? Why didn’t you say something?”
“No one’s attacking her. She’s doing it herself.”
Free of the others, she moved through the night.
Every time she thought about stopping, the girl’s face peered at her out of the shadows, driving her on. Stop it, she thought at the image. I’m doing the best I can. I’m trying to find him.
But despite her best efforts, Buffy found nothing either that night or the next four. There was no sign that a homicidal vampire or mage roamed Sunnydale.
Except for the appearance of two more gutted bodies.
The first was a boy Buffy vaguely remembered seeing around campus although they had never spoken. He’d just been there, studying in the library or hunched over a Bunsen burner in Chem. Lab. He was left in front of the building where her English class was held.
The second, a young mother of two, was left in the cemetery. Buffy found her, and after a long moment of horrified staring, Buffy left her there for someone else to discover.
I can’t be linked to them, she thought distantly around the iron fist that seemed wrapped around her mind. If I’m in jail, I can’t stop this.
Although she should be in jail because it was her fault this was happening. She had left Spike alive, and so was ultimately responsible for the deaths of these people. I can’t think about that now, Buffy told herself, and retreated into her power.
She spent most of her time there these days. It was easier. Buffy wanted to curl into a ball and cry. The Slayer could get out on the streets and hunt. Buffy couldn’t sleep because every time she closed her eyes, the faces of the dead, particularly the little girl, crowded behind her eyelids and sent her screaming awake. The Slayer didn’t need to sleep. She didn’t need to eat much either, which was good, because food was making Buffy sick.
After she found the woman in the cemetery, Buffy went back to Willie’s. The bartender met her at the door.
“He isn’t here. I’d give him up if he was.”
“Yeah, right. Sure you would.”
She pushed past him into the bar. It was mobbed. Practically the entire occult population of Sunnydale was crowded inside. They all fell silent as she entered.
“It’s true. Any of us would,” he gestured around the bar. There were general nods of agreement.
“Why?”
“Spike’s endangering everybody,” said a male vampire. He was in full vamp face, but kept his hands spread on the bar where she could see them. “We survive because most humans don’t believe in us. All we need’s a bunch of Van Helsing wannabees.”
“Besides,” another demon added. “He’s pissing you off. You usually leave us alone unless you catch us in the act. Right now, you’ve got that ‘Slay ‘em all and let the Powers that Be sort them out' look".
Anya stood there, a large purse slung over her shoulder.
“Careful with that,” she said calmly.
“What are you doing sneaking up behind me. Are you crazy? Why are you out here? Where’s Xander?”
“Xander’s asleep, and he’ll stay that way awhile.” Anya didn’t elaborate and Buffy decided she really didn’t want to know.
“How did you find me? Why did you find me?”
“You’re so deep into Slayer mode, you’re generating magic energy. I could feel it. And nobody’s seen you for days. They were worried.”
“I’ve checked in,” Buffy muttered. “The best thing I can do for them is catch Spike and this wizard.” She paused. “No one’s been trying to use magic again have they?”
“Willow and Tara haven’t, but Giles’ eyebrows are singed off and he’s being very evasive about why.”
“Damn it!” Buffy pounded her fist into her thigh. “I told them not to try anything else.”
“Yeah, well, they didn’t listen to you. Have you eaten? At any point in the recent past?”
“I’m not hungry.”
“Oh, yes, you are.” With that, she withdrew a sandwich and a bottle of water from her bag.
Buffy’s body abruptly took over and made its desires known with a huge growl from her stomach. Visions of the dead children aside, she was starving.
She inhaled the sandwich in about three bites and chugged the water. Exhausted, she leaned against the wall of the alley and slid down to rest on her heels.
“Thanks,” she said tiredly. “I didn’t realize how hungry I was.”
“You need to watch it,” Anya said critically. “The Buffy part of you needs stuff the Slayer doesn’t. You’ll burn out if you’re not careful.”
“How come you know so much about it?” Buffy asked tiredly.
“Hello. I was a demon for a few hundred years. I’ve been around the neighborhood.”
Despite herself, Buffy smiled. “Block, Anya. You’ve been around the block.”
“Whatever. The point is…” She broke off in the middle of whatever point it was, and her head came up sharply.
“What?” Buffy whispered.
“Magic’s being done nearby. Very strong.”
“Show me.”
They silently stood, and Anya led Buffy through the alley. At the mouth of the alley, she paused, eyes closed, then turned to the right and ran swiftly down the block, Buffy pacing her.
Two more streets took them back into a residential area. At least it’s not at my house this time, Buffy thought.
Anya stopped a few feet away from an intersection, shielded by a hedge that surrounded the corner house. “Around there,” she whispered. “Farther up the street.”
“Ok. You stay back.”
Anya nodded vigorously.
Every fiber of her being told her to race around the corner and attack whatever was there, but Buffy suppressed it ruthlessly, easing behind the hedge and across the yard. She would not screw up what might be her only opportunity by moving too fast. Please, let this be it. Please let me finish it tonight.
The owners of this house liked their privacy, which was fine with her. The hedge grew across the front yard as well, giving her plenty of cover. She crouched, hoping they didn’t have a huge dog for additional privacy enforcement, and peered through the hedge, letting her eyes adjust to the darkness, searching the shadows between the streetlamps.
There. A hint of movement. Across the street and two houses up, something flew out of the shadows to land in the street.
A head. The streetlight lit it like a stage play. An old woman’s head, gray hair streaming out behind. A figure strolled to the edge of the yard, still hidden by shadow except for the glint of moonlight on platinum hair.
“Shit!” Buffy swore and cleared the hedge in a jump. She landed running, headed straight at him, stake ready in her hand. No banter, no explanation, no talking. One thrust to the heart, and that would be all. And she would put the stake to her own heart if she ever again caught herself having any thought about a vampire other than the best way to kill it.
“Look out!” Anya called. “It’s a trap.”
Buffy tried to backpedal, but she was already caught, unable to move, held as securely as a fly in amber. Inexplicably, Spike stepped farther back into the shadows, then, there was a flash of light, and he vanished.
She caught movement out of the corner of her eye as someone crossed the street. Buffy swiveled her vision as hard as she could but couldn’t see who it was.
“Good evening, Buffy.”
Her heart lurched at the familiar sneering British tone. “Ethan Rayne.”
She could speak at least. That was something. Not much, though. If she screamed for help, other people would come out here and that would be bad. She wouldn’t be able to protect them. Still, she spoke as loudly as she dared, hoping Anya could hear her. She could warn the others if Buffy didn't walk away from this.
“Very good.” He moved behind her, one hand trailing across her shoulder blades, making her skin crawl. “I hardly hoped you would remember me.”
“Well, you are pretty forgettable. You can’t even do your own stunts. Have to get some vamp-for-hire to do the icky stuff while you get your rocks off.”
“Now, now.” One hand wrapped around her hair, yanked hard enough to make her eyes sting. “You’re not really in any position to exercise what passes for your wit.”
He moved in front of her and smiled at her angry expression. He wore expensive-looking slacks and a dark turtleneck, covered by a leather blazer.
“You moved up in the world,” Buffy gritted. “Find a nice sugar-daddy? Or does killing kids and old ladies pay really well?”
He continued to smile, but his eyes were icy. “Unfortunately, I can’t say the same for you, Slayer. You’re not looking too well. You’ve lost weight. But enough pleasantries. Call your friend over.”
“I don't think so.”
One of his hands clenched in the pocket of his blazer, and whatever was holding her tightened, making it hard to breathe. “Call her.”
“Screw you,” she gasped through starving lungs.
“An intriguing notion, but not this time. Very well, if you’re going to be stubborn. Young lady!” he called. “Come over here before I crush your friend’s chest and explode her heart.”
“Stay back, Anya,” Buffy choked. Rayne’s hand tightened again, and her vision began to gray. Hesitant footsteps moved toward them. Oh, God, he’ll kill both of us, and no one will know what’s happening.
No. I am the Slayer. I will not die this way.
She went into herself deeper then she ever had before, wrenching at the white hot center of her being, and the power surged up in response. Her entire body felt as if it were on fire. Hunger, grief, and weariness faded. Buffy still couldn’t breathe, but breathing was suddenly irrelevant.
Slowly, inexorably, she began to wrench free of the trap. Rayne’s face went slack-jawed in surprise, and he sprang back as one arm came free, and she lashed at him with the stake.
“Did you want to say hello to Giles?” Anya said conversationally as she held up a cell-phone that was growling alarmingly in a British accent. “He was really interested to know you were here, and he’s heading right over. Oh, and I think she’ll be loose in a minute,” she added with a glance at the struggling Slayer.
That was enough for Ethan. He backed away, muttering under his breath and gesturing hastily, and was gone in a flash like the one that had taken Spike.
Whatever had held Buffy imprisoned vanished as well, the Slayer trance broke, and she collapsed in the street.