Title: The End of Everything
Author: CJ
Pairing: None really.
Summary: Everyone is dead.
Author Notes: Okay, this came out at 1:30 am when I wasn't sure if I even still had the ability to write. I hope you enjoy it.
Dreams are funny things. They can be portents of the future, they can be hellish images of a past long forgotten, or they can just be subconscious longings for things you know you can never have.
Xander was that for me. He was my future foreseen, he was the balm to soothe the pains of the past, he was the longing I held, hidden, in my heart.
His love was a bridge between my unlife and the world around me. The thing I first noticed about him were his eyes. Deep pools of dark chocolate that could ensnare you and draw you in until you no longer cared. But it didn't end there. There were many levels to Xander, levels no one else had ever seen. He was funny and could always find a way to get a smile from anyone. But more than that, was his unfailing loyalty to anyone he deemed worthy of it. He would kill for a friend. Would stand up to the worst the hellmouth could spit out, just because you were his friend.
I didn’t see that. For so long we were, not quite enemies, but close to it. He hated me, and in my anger and pain I pretended to hate him right back. But how could I ever hate him? He was everything I could ever want. He was the sun that I could no longer see, he was the bliss I could never feel, he was my reason for living. So, what did I do? I dated the Slayer to make him notice me. Only it backfired. Oh, he noticed, but he hated too. Or at least, that's what I thought for so long.
As I sit here tonight, all I can think of is how much I wish he were here right now. Here to wrap those loving arms around me, to hold me while I cried. Here to tell me that everything would be okay, just the way he did on the day Spike was killed.
"Damn you, Xander. Why did you have to be so brave? There wasn't a thing those watchers could have done to me that I wouldn't have survived. Their needles and experiments wouldn't have killed me. All I needed was you, and now you're gone. Damn you!"
I can still hear his voice as his last words echo in my head. "I have always loved you. Even when I didn't know you, I still loved you."
Everyone I ever cared about is gone now. First Buffy died, then Dawn. Seems they really were made of the same stuff. When that demon killed Buffy, a large piece of what Dawn was died with her. But then Dawn became the Slayer. And she will go down as the shortest lived Slayer in history. She should have known better. Why didn't someone let me know? She saw it as her duty to track the demons that killed Buffy, and to try to save Spike. She should have seen that it was a trap. Her death destroyed Giles. He saw it as the last in a long line of failures. He left soon afterward to go back to London, never to set foot in America again, or so he said. With no one here to help her, Willow drowned in her own power, letting it burn through her until she was left a raving madwoman. I'm told she still screams at night. Screaming for Tara.
The Powers have chosen the wrong champion. I can't even keep my friends safe, much less alive. How could I be champion for every innocent on earth?
I know what it is I must do. I have dreaded it for these many nights. I know what to do, but I wondered if I would have the courage.
No matter now. I no longer have anything left to live for. With my friends all dead, dying, or driven mad, what else is there to do but greet the sun?
"Oh Gods, Xander, it's so beautiful. I finally understand now. All the times you begged me to never turn you if you were dying. This is what you would be giving up. This perfect masterpiece of paint splashed across the sky. But it hurts. Burns with such fury. Be well, my love. I'll be with you again."
THE END