"Okay, I take it back. Between's starting to look pretty good." She felt a warm hand slip into her left hand and give it a reassuring squeeze, a moment later the same happened with her right. She knew it was the beings that had taken the forms of her mother and Giles, but it was comforting just the same. Just knowing she wasn't alone in the darkness was good.
"Hold on," a familiar voice whispered in her left ear. She was surprised to realize it wasn't her mother's voice or Giles'.
"Almost there," murmured another voice at her right. Again the voice was familiar, but not what she had been expecting.
And then there was light. At least some light, although the overall effect was still dingy. It still took Buffy's eyes a moment to adjust after the total darkness. When she looked at the two people holding her hand, she knew who they would be, but she was still surprised by their appearance.
Long red hair, denim overalls, striped long sleeved t-shirt, smiley face book bag. Willow from sophomore year, smiling at her to her left.
Short black hair falling in his eyes, wildly patterned shirt mixed with brown pants that somehow managed not to match, Sixteen year old Xander grinned at her from her right. Buffy opened her mouth, but nothing came out.
"It's still really us," Xander said. Willow's head bobbed enthusiastically in a very Willowy manner to show her agreement. "We just thought, the other forms seemed a bit hard for you to handle, and these might be more comforting."
"Cause, the next part, it's gonna be a bit rough, you know, but we're here for you Buffy, we'll get you through it. You need to see."
"See what?" Buffy looked more closely at her surroundings, and recognition dawned on her. "I know where we are."
"Yes," The false Willow and Xander said in unison.
"I don't want to be here. I don't want to see this," Buffy said, her voice rising desperately. Her eyes became transfixed on what she hadn't seen before, what she hadn't wanted to see, and further protests caught in her throat. The two beings that looked like her friends wordlessly gripped her hands tighter as they stared down at the body of Buffy Summers. She looked like she might have been asleep, but they all knew differently.
As the three stood silently, they watched as Buffy's friends approached her body. The real Willow, supported by Tara, tears streaming down her face. Xander, his expression almost empty, lost, carrying Anya, whose pain-etched face was solemn. Giles, stoic as always except for his own tears. And Spike, bloody and broken, sprawled on the ground and weeping openly. Buffy felt her own eyes tearing, and ripped her hands from the grasps of the two images of her friends.
"Is this what you wanted me to see? See them grieve for me? Did you think I didn't know they would cry over my body?" Buffy shook her head, forcing her own tears back. "It doesn't matter, none of this matters as long as-" A noise behind her made her whirl around, and she saw her sister, standing at the bottom of the hastily erected stairwell, tears streaming down her face. "Dawn!" Buffy cried, and began to run to her sister. The beings imitating Willow and Xander looked at each other for a moment, then followed at a slower pace. Buffy reached Dawn's side and reached out to touch her face, only to find her hand pushed aside by an unseen force. She looked at her companions in askance.
"No one can see or hear us Buffy, and you can't touch. Any of them. All that you see here is fixed, can't be changed," the being Buffy had called Thing Two stated, cocking her head sadly in a Willow-like manner, her tone edged with sorrow. The Xander double just looked down, his hands in his pockets. Buffy threw up her hands in frustration.
"Then why-"
"Just watch, Buff." Thing One, now Xander, commanded softly, and Buffy found herself turning with them to watch from this new angle. The real Willow had fallen to her knees and was now crouched over Buffy, her tears falling onto the dead Slayer's face, making little rivers in the layer of dust that had settled on her. Tara kneeled behind her, her hand running through her girlfriend's hair, the only comfort she could offer at the moment. She was crying for Buffy and for Willow as well. With an anguished cry Spike suddenly rolled himself into a beam of sunlight that was coming through the unfinished building, his eyes closed, tears shining. He held himself in the shaft of light, his body beginning to smoke. Buffy gasped. None of the others even seemed to notice, so transfixed were they by the sight of the Slayer's still form. From her vantage point Buffy felt her sister rush past her, her scream a keening wail of pain.
"Spike!" Dawn shrieked, hurtling herself as fast as her dress and injuries would allow, throwing herself on top of him and rolling him out of the sunlight just as he burst into flames.
"Dawn!" Buffy screamed, looking at the young Xander and Willow images who were her companions. "Do something! Stop this!" The two looked at her sadly, shuffling their feet but saying nothing. Buffy tore her gaze back to what was happening, frustration tearing her up inside.
"Oh, God!" the real Xander moaned in horror as the dress Dawn was wearing caught fire, torn between wanting to go to their aid and his reluctance to let go of Anya. Giles seemed paralyzed by the sight of Dawn clinging to Spike, her screams rising as the fire spread.
"Do something!" Buffy screamed, running towards her sister even though she knew there was nothing she could do. Almost as if they heard her cry, Tara and Willow's heads both snapped up, Willow's eyes the now familiar black.
"Madesco!" Willow said softly but with power. Instantly water fell from out of nowhere and doused the pair. The fire was immediately extinguished. Spike and Dawn looked like flood victims. Water pooled around them, but nowhere else. Spike blinked several times in pain before looking at the shivering girl still clinging to his neck, sobbing brokenly.
"Don't...leave...me...please...can't...leave...me...Spike..." Spike seemed to come to some kind of decision, nodding so imperceptibly that Buffy thought she was the only one who probably noticed. He placed his arms around the shaking girl, holding her to him.
"It'll be okay, platelet. Spike's here, not going anywhere. I'll be with you, Dawn. Till the end of the world." He held her closer, realizing quickly that the wetness that slicked his hands was not water but blood. He instinctively reverted to game face as Dawn's sobs suddenly subsided and she slumped forward with a small cry. "We've got to get her out of here, she's hurt," Spike snapped tersely.
"Anya needs a doctor too," Xander added, looking down with concern at his girlfriend. She looked back at him, her eyes still not quite focused.
"S'okay, Xander, just a bad dream. Got to get up, I'm opening the shop for Giles," Anya murmured as if to support Xander's statement, stirring weakly in his arms.
"We can't leave Buffy here," Willow said softly, her voice rough with tears shed and unshed. She looked up at Giles, his expression still distant. She frowned at him. "Can you...?"
"Never mind me!" Buffy screamed, standing at a midpoint between where Spike lay with Dawn and where her own body rested, looking desperately at each of her friends in turn. "Dawn needs a doctor! Get her to a hospital!"
"I said, Dawn's hurt. She needs a doctor and she needs it now," Spike unknowingly echoed. "We have to go!" Spike stood with difficulty, his face an exquisite mask of pain, and limped across the room with the unconscious girl cradled in his arms.
"Wait. You'll just burst into flames again before you go two feet, Spike. Which is, you know, fine with me, but then you'll drop Dawn. Just hold on. Hold on," Xander gently kissed Anya on her forehead, then laid her in Tara's welcoming arms. "Watch her for me, Tara, please." Tara nodded, her hand brushing Anya's hair back in a soothing gesture as the other never left Willow's head. Xander looked at Giles for a moment, then shook his head as he hurried away. "I'm going to get a vehicle, the first one I find that's big enough, and drive it right in here, so be ready."
Spike gave him one quick, almost grateful nod, then sank to the ground again, Dawn still cradled in his arms like a child. Angry blisters were beginning to form on skin exposed by the burned garment she wore. Giles still stood like a statue, and Spike began to bellow at him in pain and frustration.
"Some Watcher you turned out to be, Rupert. Let the Slayer die, let her sister burn so her sacrifice would mean nothing. How could you? What would Buffy say?" At the last Giles seemed to snap from his frozen state, striding irately across the room to tower over the vampire.
"You will not speak her name again. You haven't the right, she's a...an angel, a hero, I will not have you sully her memory by daring to presume that you could possibly know what she would say or feel!"
"Giles, don't," Buffy called softly, the murderous anger in his eyes causing her heart to further break into a million pieces.
"Giles, stop it. This isn't helping!" Willow called desperately, tears still falling freely from her eyes although her sobs had subsided. She still leaned over Buffy, running shaking fingers over her cold cheeks and through her blonde hair, as if she could somehow soothe her. Giles didn't reply or turn towards her, but he did move away from Spike and Dawn standing with his back to them all.
"Please, enough. No more. Please tell me my sister is going to be alright." Buffy turned away from the tableau of pain her friends presented and faced the two people in the room that could see her and answer her questions. The two looked at each other for a long moment before the Xander one answered.
"The injuries she has aren't life threatening. She can recover from them." Buffy sagged in relief before noting the carefully worded answer.
"Wait, that's not the same thing as saying she'll be okay. She will be okay, right?" The Willow double tucked her hair behind her ear in a nervous gesture, then reached out and grabbed Buffy's hand.
"That part isn't fixed yet. It depends on a lot of different things, not the least of which is you and your decision."
"Are you saying that you'll hurt my sister unless I agree to be the Slayer again?" Buffy asked sharply. Both the Xander and Willow look-alikes recoiled in horror.
"God, no, Buffy!" Thing Two gasped.
"We would never harm her or anyone else. You have to know that. This isn't about us and what we'll do. This is about the fate of all humankind, and that includes your sister." The Xander duplicate added solemnly.
"I don't understand." Buffy looked back and found she couldn't tear her eyes away from her sister, so fragile, cradled in Spike's arms. "I don't understand any of this. Why show me this if there's nothing I can do to help?"
"You need to know what cannot be changed, in order to understand that which is not yet certain," the false Willow recited, her tone reminding Buffy of the way her friend would read fortune cookies, only this Xander was unlikely to add the "in bed" phrase to this particular declaration. He simply looked at her and shrugged.
"I know it's confusing, Buff. Please, just let us finish showing you everything. I think you'll understand by the time we're done."
"Xander? Why is it so dark?" Anya cried out suddenly, and Buffy shuddered.
"Is Anya...?" She began, but the Willow and Xander look-alikes simply grasped her hands in the same positions they had originally arrived in, their faces grim.
"It's time to go, Buffy," Thing One said firmly, his dark brown eyes unreadable.
"Time to go," echoed Thing Two, now avoiding Buffy's gaze.
"But..." Buffy's protests died on her lips as the scene shimmered into blackness yet again.