She looked up into the man’s anxious sweating face.
“I need you to come with me! Hurry!”
Buffy snorted. “I guess that’s more original than ‘Do you want a piece of candy, little girl?’ but, sorry, still not interested.”
He took a deep breath, tried to calm. “You don’t understand.”
“I understand you’re creeping me out. And that I’m not going anywhere with you.”
“You must! Everything depends on you!”
Something…his urgency, his fear…penetrated the shell of her self-absorption and touched a part of her that had lain sleeping until that moment. She suddenly had an urgent desire to rewind the last few minutes, making it so that she stayed inside the building where this crazy old guy couldn’t find her. But she couldn’t rewind time (at least, not yet), and that part of her wouldn’t go back to sleep. Slowly, hesitantly, Buffy stood...
And everything changed.
He turned the page eagerly, the rustle the only sound in the Coucil library. At last, he had found the key to the translation. Travers would be pleased.
Giles sat back with a sigh of scholarly satisfaction. Keep on like this, and perhaps he would be chosen as a Watcher someday. Although, they might decide that his skills were better suited to research, which in truth, might please him more. The business of Slaying and Watching seemed to be undergoing changes as the years passed. The Council didn’t like it, and neither did Rupert Giles.
Take poor Merrick for example. When the previous Slayer fell, the Powers had inexplicably not Called Kindra, who had trained for the role since childhood. No, the role had landed on somebody in California, of all places, and Merrick had to go rabbiting off to find her while the expected Chosen One remained with her teacher.
Hopefully, poor Jackson was settling back in. He’d been Watcher for Sylvia Rawlings, the Slayer who had just…passed away…and had returned to Council headquarters only the night before, apparently one step from nervous collapse.
Giles shook his head. It was ridiculous for a Watcher to become so involved with the Slayer. Surely, he had known she would fall one day. It was regrettable, of course, but that was the business they were in. The Slayer fell and a new one was Chosen. That was how it worked. One trained her and did the best one could to keep her alive, but it was only intelligent to remember that the relationship was by no means long-term.
He removed his glasses to polish them...
And everything changed.
The book he was reading tore from his hands and crashed to the floor. Giles leaped to his feet as other books toppled from the shelves and papers flew around the room in a whirlwind. He ran for the door, but it opened and closed repeatedly in front of him, banging in its frame.
A sound from behind brought him spinning around as the glass shattered in the windows, letting sunlight pour into the library.
He fell back against the wall, and opened his mouth to yell for help.
And it was over.
He stared around at the quiet library. Books were back on the shelves and table and papers were in their accustomed stacks. Rain drummed against the intact windows.
“Harris, you’re up!”
There were groans from the other boys on the bench.
“This’ll be quick.”
“Duck, so you don’t get hit by the bat.”
“Hey, Harris! Just swing three times here and move to the end of the line!”
Xander tried to cover the pain caused by the jeers with his patented ‘aw-shucks’ grin. It might have hurt less if he didn’t fundamentally agreed with them. Him at bat was pretty much a non-issue.
He took his place by home plate and picked up the bat, swinging it cautiously in his sweaty grasp.
Just three times, and I can sit down.
The ball spun past, once, twice. The laughter and catcalls increased.
One more time. I can take it one more time. Then, I can eat lunch with Will.
The white globe shot toward him...
And everything changed.
Cool strength poured into him, calming his mind, clearing his vision. The ball seemed to slow, taking forever to cover the distance between pitcher’s mound and batting diamond. There was simply no way to miss as he swung.
Bat met ball with an explosive crack, and the pitcher and outfielder flattened to the ground as the ball sailed across the field like a rocket, over the fence and out of sight.
Patiently, Willow waited for a turn at the mirror. It wasn’t as if her stick-straight hair needed combing or she had makeup to fix. Her brown jumper didn’t need any attention. But all the other girls were primping, and she thought she might as well too.
Harmony met her gaze in the reflection and smiled. “Don’t bother, Willow. It’s totally beyond help, unless you’ve got a paper bag or something.” Her friends, or at least the people she hung out with laughed. Cordelia sneered slightly but was too busy enhancing her own flawless complexion to pay much attention.
Willow’s mouth tightened in anger, but she dropped her eyes, unable to think of a response other than ‘Bitch’, which would make Harmony laugh and say something about just who was a dog around here...
And everything changed.
“Oh!” Harmony yelped, as her lip gloss suddenly slipped and drew a large pink line across her face. She scrubbed at it frantically, but it wouldn’t come off. In fact, it seemed to become darker, the more she worked at it. The other girls, quick to turn on an outsider, laughed at the blonde’s distress.
“Stop squealing already,” Cordelia said irritably. "I've got a headache and you're making it worse."
She grabbed Harmony’s chin and applied a paper towel roughly to her face.
“Cut that out!” Harmony shrieked and slapped Cordelia, to the vast enjoyment of the other inhabitants of the girl’s bathroom. Cordelia grabbed a fistful of the Harmony’s hair and the fight boiled out into the hall.
Willow, smiling, looked into the now-free mirror. Somebody other than her looked back, a pale-haired girl with soft blue eyes that she’d never seen before.
But I know her. I’ve always known her.
Willow reached toward the mirror, and thought the other girl had also raised a hand towards her, but the image faded and was replaced by a series of quick flashes.
…Another blond girl, this one with a very determined chin, looked at her and smiled, although her eyes remained grave.
…An older man with glasses stared at her with a worried expression.
…Xander, looking stronger and older than the one she knew
…A boy with reddish hair and wry smile that she thought she somehow knew like she’d known the first blond girl.
…A scary-looking man with hair dyed white. He grinned at her cockily, sending her stumbling back from the mirror, but the grin faded, replaced by a look of sorrow.
…A very young girl with long dark hair, whose image was somehow misty.
And then Willow’s own pale, huge-eyed reflection was staring back at her.
She sat up, not knowing what had awakened her. It was still full day, not time to rise as yet.
She looked over at Spike and smiled faintly. He slept heavily, sated by feeding and sex. Drusilla reached out, teased a platinum strand around her fingers. She thought about ripping it out, but he was cranky when he woke, and she didn’t want to deal with his temper.
She slipped lightly from the bed and caught up Miss Edith, waltzing with the doll around the room. They were leaving for Romania soon, Spike said, getting back to their roots. Drusilla didn’t care, most places were the same to her, most things were the same…
And everything changed.
She felt it, felt the world twist and shift, felt everything remake itself. Drusilla turned, whimpering and saw that Spike had begun to thrash, hands clutching at his head as if in pain. He was moaning something, a word over and over, but in her distress, she couldn’t make it out.
She could almost see it, almost knew what was changing, but the knowledge slipped away from her grasp, as if someone didn’t want her to know.
Drusilla ran back to the bed and caught Spike’s shoulder, shaking him roughly, nails digging into his skin. He sat up with a yell, catching her wrist in a grip that would have broken a human’s bones, but his hold loosened as he recognized her.
“God,” he muttered, plowing his other hand through his hair. “Nightmare. Like something that might come out of your head.” Spike’s eyes softened as he looked at her. “Are you all right, Poodle? Did I scare you?”
She shook her head although her eyes filled with tears. “It’s begun,” she whispered.
She crawled on the bed next to Spike and burrowed against him, knowing that she would not always be able to do this, that the time in which he would be there for her had suddenly become finite.
He stroked the black waves of her hair. “What’s begun?” he asked softly.
Drusilla closed her eyes. “I don’t know, I don’t know. The ending.”