Author: Tim Knight
Title: Scooby Snack: Mystery Meat
Copyright: April 2003
Rating: PG-13 (language, fight scenes)
Spoilers:
Buffy: Season 2 until Phases.
Highlander: Season 5 until Season finale. Richie Ryan lives.
Keywords: Buffy/ Highlander.
Summary: Using the same "mini-story"
format as your usual Scooby Snacks, but this is anything but. In this one, we ask "What If" and turn a certain point in
Wanderer continuity on its head.
Legalese: All characters except those noted below with their respective rights, properties, and copyrights are the
property of the respective creators, authors, owners, producers and agencies. These characters are used without
permission. No copyright infringement is intended or meant, and no money will be made from this story. This story may
be copied in its entirety, and may be distributed as long as all copyright information remains.
The character Shaw Hunter is mine. Anyone wishing to use her may contact me at
doobytim@aol.com.
The characters Steven St. Wolf, Frank Iverson, Marc Le Chevalier, Randi and Brian Jessup, and the Knights of the
Order of the Grail are property of Steve Pantovich, as is the universe in which this story takes place.
Steve can be contacted at Steve711@concentric.net.
The character Robin Goodfellow belongs to Mike Weyer. Mike can be contacted at
SWERJ321@msn.com.
Author's Notes: Having some fun with our stuff and hoping that you’ll be surprised by where we go with it. Hopefully
this will make others wonder just what might have been at various points in the lives or realities of our beloved
heroes.
Dedications:
To Steve, Grand High Poobah of the Wandererverse, giving us the okays to have fun.
To Jack, for giving this his editing talents and possibly making things even
more surprising.
To Mike, whose own comic book tastes and experience helped when I talked to him about this.
Here are the changes from your regular shows that might play a part in this story:
Buffy:
1. Buffy is Immortal in the sense of the Highlander series, because of her drowning death in Prophecy Girl.
She was Immortal for nearly a year before she discovered her new nature.
2. Kendra did not die in the Wandererverse, at least not until July of 1998, when she was gravely injured fighting a
demon summoned directly from Hell. While she died on the operating table, she was revived and returned to action by
November of 1998.
3. Faith was Chosen a month later than in the Buffyverse, and the tensions with the Council led her to believe that
Buffy and Kendra were dead. However, it also led to her Watcher surviving for
months beyond her Buffyverse counterpart. Faith did not come to Sunnydale until January of 1999.
4. Jenny is still alive, as Wanderer continuity splits from the Buffyverse on February 2nd, 1998. Jenny
and Giles got engaged and are now a live-in couple. Giles has also uses his magical abilities more often than in the
Buffyverse.
Near The Bronze
Sunnydale, California
4 September 1998
Shawukay’s heart caught in her throat as one of the vampires clubbed the young human woman on the back of the head, sending her to her knees. She quickly made her choice; she left her hidden position in order to assist the downed woman.
To her dismay the vampires were arguing over who was going to feed off of this girl first, the one she’d only seen from a distance while inside the local children’s establishment. One of the vampires noticed her approach and snidely said, "Well, a second course."
Her lips curled into an angry snarl as she slowly drew her sword. <I will not let it happen again…> she vowed.
"The Hunter! Kill her!" their apparent leader shouted. Apparently, these blood drinkers had noticed the rounds she had made in this town. Shawukay cursed; she didn’t think that they would associate the white faerie fire with her person so quickly.
She reached down to her hip and pulled out one of the two daggers she carried. A quick flip and toss later, the hilt was sticking out of a male vampire’s stomach. She knew that the blessing she’d laid upon the silver-alloy blade was sending agonizing pain through his stomach. She had little time to rest on her laurels, because one of his companions, a woman this time, charged her.
She easily sidestepped the clumsy attack and swung Soulreaver with a spinning back slash, the Myth Drannor blade cleanly severing the creature’s leg from the rest of its body. The soulless creature fell to the ground, screaming. Shawukay felt the familiar anger welling inside her, but she kept it under her control. Now, when the first kin she’d seen in half her lifetime was in mortal danger, was not the time and place to lose herself to her rage.
With two injured, the Forestarm focused her attention on the leader, who was holding the human girl whose blood she shared by the neck, in a position to protect himself from her blade. Shawukay tried to think of a way to resolve the situation, but her speed was no match for the blood drinker’s. She started to stalk forward, closing the distance between them as she frantically thought of a stratagem.
The vampire tightened his grip on this person whose name she didn’t even know. "Stop or I’ll break her neck!" he shouted. Shawukay did, but knew that the vampire would kill her anyway if he managed to extricate himself from the standoff.
<There is no way I can free her, unless…> Shawukay felt a cold chill in her heart fighting the rage she felt at having kin once again being harmed by vampires. She had no physical options open to her, so that left mystical. Her spell repertoire and religious powers were limited in scope, but she had a spell that might work, although in her experience, the undead were hard to stop with charming magics. But it was all she had.
Shawukay began whispering under her breath in the Common tongue, hastily chanting a prayer to the Goddess that would force the vampire to unhand the young woman. She felt the divine energy of the Lady of the Forest build within her and shouted, "RELEASE HER!!!"
The power of her Mother lashed out, erupting and spilling over the vampire in a rush of mystical might. Shawukay found herself wishing she could see the vampire’s face for any indication of the spell’s success, but she had to rely on the overall movements of his body because of her infravision. She watched as the vampire jerked and the tiniest bit of triumph trumpeted in her breast until the creature’s cold, bluish form became solid again.
<Nooooo…> she wailed before bringing her sword back up. She was out of time and options.
"Say bye-bye, bitch," she heard him giggle triumphantly. Shawukay desperately launched herself at the vampire, but she knew in her breaking heart she was too late.
Her rage transformed into hopelessness as her brain made her see the next two seconds in painful slow motion. The vampire tightened his grip even more. His yellow eyes flashed in triumph. He twisted her only kin’s head around ninety degrees.
Her sharpened sense of hearing heard the cracking sound of the woman’s vertebrae as the vampire made good its threat. She saw the way the woman’s body suddenly sagged in the demon’s grip, like a puppet without strings. She heard the choked gasp emitting from her own throat as she relived her greatest failure, one she’d sworn would never happen again.
Events sped up again as the vampire released the teenaged Terran woman’s body and let it drop like a sack of wheat. Shawukay could only stare at the dropping body as the creature responsible for the pain her kin had suffered turned and ran off into the night. She didn’t follow; she didn’t try to stop him with magic.
She only knew the hopeful things she’d dared to dream had shattered before her.
The half-elf brokenly fell to her knees and desperately crawled over to the woman lying on the sidewalk. Sobs threatened to be the only thing she was capable of uttering, as she desperately tried to focus on what little chance she had to save this woman’s life. She knew that she had to heal the injuries first, before doing anything else.
"Please, no…" she whispered, switching to Chondathan, her native tongue. She began to pray, calling on her single higher-level healing spell, hoping that it would be enough to fix the damage done to her neck. Shawukay’s hands lit up with a soft, golden colored light and she cradled the girl’s head in her left hand, placing her illuminated right on the cracked neck. She felt the power flare and, as was the case with her healing spells, told her exactly what damage there had been and what needed to be fixed.
She felt the bones knit and snap back into place, but she knew that this was just the beginning. Only half the battle had been won, but half was not good enough. Only total victory in this frantic war would be sufficient.
The young Faerunian’s hands flared until the damage was repaired, and she knew that the single spell had been enough. So she turned her attention to the next step, something she’d been almost force-fed by Jonathan and Mark during her time with them. It had been something of a shock, what they’d told her and taught her, but she now realized that something she’d originally thought as a violation of everything she believed in, might be the only thing to keep her soul from tearing apart.
She forced herself to remember the lessons and tilted the girl’s head back. She put her ear next to the girl’s mouth and almost panicked at the lack of breath. She did what she’d been reluctantly allowed them to instruct her in; she gave her only kin two quick breaths. She then moved to the next phase. She interlocked her hands the way she’d been shown and lined them up over the part of the woman’s chest that protected her heart.
She began pushing, barely remembering the rhythm and the count before repeating the process. Her world shrank until the only thing she could see or acknowledge was her ministrations, and the dying hope that faltered with each passing minute. There wasn’t any magic that would work here, only the physical.
She lost track of how long she kept pushing and breathing, refusing to just give up and accept defeat, no matter how futile.
Hope was the only thing she had left.
*****
Sunnydale Cemetery
Sunnydale, California
4 September 1998
// JENNY!!! // came the shout from Salem.
From the tone and panic she could feel from her and Rupert’s Guardian, she knew this wasn’t good news. <What is it?> she asked, dreading what answer might await her.
// Blackie just shouted at us! Amy… // Salem, who seemed to be the "second in command" of the Guardian Spirits behind Duke, faltered, as if he couldn’t bring himself to report the news. Jenny’s heart skipped several beats because she suspected the worst.
For some reason, it brought to mind the one time she’d heard someone’s voice crack like that; when Walter Cronkite had reported the death of JFK. Her voice was a whisper. "Rupert…"
"Dear Lord…"
<Salem, is she…>
The miserable, heart-wrenching silence was enough. However, Jenny and Giles knew that what was spawning in their hearts and minds would have to wait. Instead, they turned to what they could use to bring about payment for the loss they knew in their cores that they’d just suffered.
<Where is she?> Jenny said, her voice evolving into something hard and determined, rapidly ascending past that to a dark anger.
She knew Rupert was in the same mood and appreciated it. They would make someone pay for this. If not the entire team, then them specifically. After all, she was Romany and Rupert…
"Lead us to the bastards," a Cockney accent void of any hint of warmth or fatherly love ordered.
The Gypsy and the Ripper moved with purpose. A dark purpose for one of their children.
*****
Weatherly Park
Sunnydale, California
4 September 1998
Xander and Cordelia received the news at the same time, but from their respective Guardians. Cordelia had almost broken into tears, but Xander kept her focused on getting to her before she was discovered by anyone else, namely vamps or the cops.
The possibility of Amy being handled like that was the only thing that got the Dark Amazon’s ire strong enough to overwhelm her grief.
They moved with all the speed their empowerments gave them. As they did so, they called Willow and Oz to meet them there as quickly as possible. However, they knew that in the way that most mattered, they were too late.
*****
Near the Bronze
Sunnydale, California
4 September 1998
Tears streaming down her face like white water rapids she’d traveled upon more than once in her Harper career, Shawukay continued to perform the procedure that might restore life to her cousin’s body, to bring her spirit back to the mortal coil.
But she’d been going at it for ten minutes straight and while her mind told her that the six-minute window she’d been told had passed, her heart demanded that she keep up the fight. She would not give up!
<Seven… eight… nine…> she counted to herself, keeping up the beats. She barely noticed that her movements were slowing and that her arms were aching more than they would if she’d blocked a sword blow.
All she knew was that she had to keep going. Otherwise, she didn’t know what she’d do. <I cannot stop! Please Mother help me…>
The loud screech of an approaching automobile broke her concentration and she faltered, her joined hands slipping from their location. She had to brace herself to keep from falling across the body. Her heart shouted at her to continue, but she knew from the fading colors of the form on the ground before her that everything she’d done had been to no avail. It was too little, too late.
She felt a coldness come over her, something all too familiar. When she heard car doors open and close, and shouts coming from Xander Harris and Cordelia Chase’s throats, shouting one word over and over, she almost hesitated and called back to them, falsely hoping that they might be able to do something, to pull a miracle out of thin air.
But instead, she stood up and felt as if she were shrinking into herself. Every instinct told her to stay here and handle what needed to be done, but she also knew that the people approaching would not be in any mood to believe the truth. She didn’t want to believe it. So Shawukay did the hardest thing she had ever done.
She turned around and, hating herself more than she ever had, abandoned the body of the only family she had in two worlds. The family she’d lost before even getting to know.
*****
"Oh Goddess, no…" Cordy moaned as she found the body lying on the sidewalk. She looked at the two unconscious vampires and the single pile of dust on the ground, realizing what had happened. But somehow, something didn’t add up.
Xander also had tears coming free as they were treated to the thing they could no longer deny; Amy was gone. They always knew the risks and accepted them, but here it was; hard, cold reality. He knelt down along with Cordy on separate sides of their slain friend and let the tears take him.
Cordy leaned over and cradled the upper half of Amy’s body to her and started sobbing uncontrollably, muttering Amy’s name over and over again. The young man who loved her with all his heart formed a silent vow to himself, that when they found the vamp who’d done this to their sister…
<When it comes time to pay, Hell will barely be the cover charge,> Xander promised.
*****
Sunnydale High School
Sunnydale, California
6 September 1998
Willow stalked through the hallway in a foul mood, one that only got worse with every moment. She looked around at the other students and felt nothing but a cold anger for the way they shook off Amy’s death as another in a long, long series of students not making it through high school.
She didn’t care that some of them, like Michael, were going through the shell shock some of Amy’s friends felt. She didn’t care that some of them had openly cried once the news spread. What she cared about was that they didn’t know jack shit about the truth and how it was nothing compared to what she and everyone in the library was feeling.
They couldn’t possibly understand what they were going through. They had no way of experiencing the frustration, anger, and sheer grief she, Cordy, Jenny, and Buffy suffered.
Some of the other kids had just shrugged it off. Some of them had offered hollow words of sympathy, never mind it couldn’t help. Willow eyed everyone in the hallways with cold fury.
One of them was a liar who’d had the unmitigated gall to break into Amy’s locker and take things from it, things that rightfully should have been gathered by her and Jenny. Every single thing that hinted of Amy’s secret life had been removed. What Willow found even more infuriating was that a very special picture, one of Amy and the whole team, had been stolen along with the items.
Willow had wanted to make that picture the item she placed into Amy’s casket at her funeral that afternoon. Now she couldn’t.
<If I find out who stole it, I’ll make them pay. I swear it, by Goddess!>
She mechanically walked into the lunchroom, where the others were waiting. Snyder had tried to pitch a fit at all of them, Giles and Jenny included, leaving after the next period, but of all people it had been Amy’s Dad who’d threatened to sue the school board and Snyder personally if he pulled anything to hurt them in their grieving process. The little red witch still couldn’t believe how Mister Connors had known all along that Amy’s family was full of witches, and how he’d asked them what she’d done with her powers.
She still remembered how he’d only broken down after Giles had told him how she’d stood toe-to-toe with the others in Los Angeles, firing bullet after bullet into Throlog as they tried to stop the world from ending.
"Will?" a strained, familiar voice said, piercing her doom and gloom thoughts. The redhead turned to see Buffy, who was just as ready to break out in tears as she was. Her best friend softly asked, "Still thinking about the stuff?"
Willow could only shake her head. She sat down and stared at the table; she didn’t want anything to eat. All she could think about was that afternoon. "I want the bastard that did this. I want both of them."
"We’ll get them," Oz told her, taking her hand and squeezing it, but she snatched it away from him. Usually, it helped. But not today.
"You really think whoever took her stuff was the same vamp who killed her?" Xander asked. "It just doesn’t make sense."
Willow spitted him with a glare, wanting to scream, ‘Of course not, dumbass! Nothing makes sense ‘cause Amy’s dead!’ Instead, she drew breath to say something a bit more diplomatically but Cordelia spoke first.
"Will," she said, the warning plainly evident in her voice, "you need to try and keep it together." She fixed her bloodshot eyes on her Amazon sister, who told her, "Two more hours, then we can cry all we want."
She tried to think of a comeback but knew that like her, the others were barely holding on. Especially Jenny. So she bit down her mixed-up feelings and just muttered, "I wish we could have saved her."
"We all wish that," Buffy replied, her eyes starting to grow moist. Willow knew she hated herself more than anyone, except Robin; Buffy believed that if she and Steve had been in town, it would’ve made a difference. Poor Robin was beside himself in his grief as well. He’d offered to walk her home but she’d refused. "I promise you, Will, we’ll find whoever did this and make them pay."
Although Artemis had shown herself in their grief to comfort them and to assure them that Amy was being well-cared for in Olympus at the Lady’s side, unspoken was the whole matter of whether or not this was tied into this prophecy thing. No one had asked, no one had offered any theories. It was hard enough to deal with the basic fact that Amy was dead, without speculating on "what ifs."
She heard Xander growl under his breath and she looked up to see what he was looking at. It was that new girl, the one he thought had something up her sleeve. Her anger flared again as she got ready to tell Xander that she didn’t care about Shaw Hunter right now, Amy was what mattered, when Oz suddenly said, "She was there."
Every eye at the table, including her witch-green ones, turned to Oz, whose face took on an unfamiliar intensity. His blue eyes seemed less like a man’s and more like a Siberian husky’s, a look of predator in them. "What are you saying?" Willow asked, the only one brave enough to go into that territory.
Oz looked at her, then around the table, putting himself back under that control the others always envied. "Her scent," he whispered, eyes flicking back and forth. "I told you there was someone else there, and I just placed her scent."
"Don’t look!" Buffy hissed, keeping them from acting on human impulse. The others looked to her but she stayed focused on Oz. "Oz, you better be sure about this."
He gave her a slow nod, that single dip of the head Willow recognized so well. "Same scent…" He cocked an eyebrow. "Less sweat, more really screwed up emotions."
Willow looked around at the others, taking in their reactions. Buffy was keeping herself on tight leash. Oz was… well, Oz. Xander and Cordy, though, had the same thing running through their eyes; they were pissed and just about to go thermonuclear on the exchange student.
Buffy snapped, "Don’t." That one word held a "you’d damn better do whatever the Hell I say or else" tone to it, and still it barely kept her best friend and her Amazon sister from going ballistic. Cordy especially trembled with rage. She wanted to hurt something, really, really badly. The Slayer quietly said, "Not here, not now. We’ll deal with her after the funeral."
The mention of their plans for the afternoon dragged their spirits back down in the dumps and Willow made a mental note to look into Shaw Hunter before anyone else did. She sent a last look in the girl’s direction before saying, "After the funeral. You got it, Buffy."
******
Gates of Heaven Cemetery
Sunnydale, California
Late hours
6 September 1998
Shawukay slowly weaved her way through the graveyard, searching out the headstone she needed so desperately to find. All she’d known was that today was when she had been interred, and that this was where her final resting place would be. She carefully looked at the headstones, their stone still retaining the barest vestiges of heat from the day’s sunlight, and the ground at their base.
After an hour of futile searching and growing self-anger, she finally found what she was looking for; freshly laid earth. She couldn’t read the name inscribed without sufficient light, so Shawukay looked around and made certain she was alone. Satisfied as to that, she looked at the cold stone marker in front of her and uttered a light spell.
A ball of light burst into existence in the palm of her hand and she slowly looked over the English phrasing engraved into the granite.
Amy Christine Madison
March 17, 1981 – September 4, 1998
Beloved daughter, sister and friend
She gave her life for all of us
<Seventeen. She was only seventeen.> Shawukay’s heart burst with the grief she’d been holding at bay for the last two days and knelt in front of the grave, reading the inscription again and letting her lips tremble.
She hated the fact that she hadn’t been there in time. She hated the fact she hadn’t been able to stand at the side of those who had fought alongside her when they had laid her to rest today. But most of all, she hated the thought that she would never have what she needed; Amy to know her.
She dimly realized that by coming here, she’d done something she had never done with her Grandparents. She’d never been able to muster the courage to visit their resting places. She knew why. Because it would require admitting that they were gone and that she was alone. But this time, she felt the need to at least see for herself, the results of not being there in time.
She couldn’t think of anything to say, because she’d already thought it. I’m sorry. I tried. I wish I could have been faster. But none of that would matter. So she said the first thing that came to mind, something that she prayed Amy’s spirit would hear and accept.
"There is so much I wanted to tell you," she whispered, her throat tight with sadness. "I came here because I was needed, but I was told that you would know who I was, that you would be the one to tell the others that I was…" She bowed her head in shame; she had no right to claim any kinship to the woman lying here. But it was all she had in this place, that she had to cling to. "We, we are kin, Amy. You and I. I…" The words flowed faster and she told the only connection she had to this world the story. "I am Alison’s great-granddaughter, Amy. I am… you are all I had. You are all I could have had here. I…"
Nothing could come out, nothing that she could bring herself to say to the woman who, until two nights ago, had been the one thing she dared to hope would fill a hole in her heart. So instead of trying to validate her link to she who was no longer here, the soul-tired half-elf told her about why she was here.
"There is a prophecy, that is the reason I am here," she hissed, the words coming out as her breath, "but it was not supposed to be this way. I was supposed to tell you who I was, so you could tell others who I am." Her eyes closed and she went on, clasping her hands together and conscious of her body shaking even more. "I wanted to talk to you. I wanted you to know who I was, even if it meant you knowing what I was. I…" She started sobbing and cried, "It’s my fault, Amy. It’s my fault you are g-gone… I’m so sorry…"
Shawukay didn’t know how long she cried, nor did she care. All she knew was that she couldn’t hold it in, because that way lie a path she didn’t want to chance, ever again.
When her tears were spent, she wiped her face and looked the stone over again. There were so many questions she had, that she could never now get answers to. But she hoped that someday, she might find a way to learn what she wanted to discover. But for now, she had things that needed doing. And although it tore at her to leave this site at all, let alone so soon, Shawukay had a duty to perform.
She stood up and brushed the dirt off of her royal blue sweat pants. The ranger pulled up the hood to the sweatshirt she wore and gazed at Amy’s marker once more.
"I will return later," she promised, wishing she could be talking to Amy herself instead of what remained of her cousin. She started to turn but stopped, giving Amy one last statement.
"I love you," she whispered.
She strode towards the rear of the cemetery, wrapping herself in her mourning and hoping that someday, she might make sense of why things had gone so wrong.
*****
The Bronze
Sunnydale, California
Early hours
7 September 1998
The vampire staggered back and collided with a group of refuse receptacles, causing them to clatter loudly as he fell amongst the rubbish. Unlike their first encounter, the blood drinker had no cocky, self-absorbed grin on his face.
This time, all that his twisted visage had upon it was fear and the knowledge that he was about to perish.
Shawukay stalked forward, waiting for him to try and rush her again. He had three shallow cuts on his body, one in each arm and one along his stomach. She held her swords at the ready, awaiting the undead human’s next reaction. He stood up and tried backing away again, but Shawukay’s quick casting of a shield spell blocked off the other exit.
He was trapped and there was nothing he could do about it.
She stood ready, Soulreaver in her right hand and the sword entrusted to her care by the spirit Jehanne in her left. This was the first time she’d ever held the sword in the way it was meant to be used. But she was not going to let this vampire escape her.
The vampire remembered her, all right. He was trembling and begging for his life. "I-I don’t have another girl. I’ll do anything you want, just don’t kill me!" he shrieked.
The old feelings she’d nursed for thirteen years propelled her forward, slowly stalking the creature that was responsible for the death of her cousin. She was sorely tempted to make this creature suffer, but she somehow knew in her heart, that to do so would violate everything that she liked to believe her kin had stood for.
That was pretty much the only thing that stayed her hand.
"Look, I know you’re pissed. I’ll do anything, dammit!" he shouted in a rising panic. "She was just a human, Hunter! She isn’t worth killing me over!"
Shawukay almost lost herself in that instant. She brought her swords up and as the vampire screamed like the truly condemned, she crossed her longswords and put the point where the blades crossed at the midpoint of his neck.
"Yes, she was human, you demonic bastard. She was human." She leaned forward, letting the blades dig deep enough into his neck to draw the tiniest specks of blood. "I am half human. And it was through that human blood, blood that we shared, that she was the only family I had left!"
She saw the realization dawn in the vampire’s eyes and she also saw the look of triumph flash through his eyes that Amy’s death had been so personal to her. She brought the blades closer together, like a pair of scissors, ready to chop the vampire’s head off. She saw the crosses, the symbol of Jonathan’s God, flare as the blade they were engraved upon dug deeper into his cold, animated flesh.
But again, she hesitated. She wanted to hurt him. She wanted so much to make him pay as she’d paid for not being closer to Amy when she’d been attacked. But she couldn’t go through with it. She couldn’t bring herself to end his existence, never mind that she knew he was evil, and in fact a form of tanar'ri.
She just couldn’t do it. Because she didn’t know…
"Well, Scotty?" a familiar voice called out, shaking her from her inner struggle. "You gonna finish him or not!"
The vampire tried to take advantage of her distraction but she lashed out in time, kicking him in the balls and doubling him over. Unheeding of the twin lines of blood dripping on his neck, Shawukay then hit him with a side kick that connected with his jaw, sending him onto his backside. She backed up and held her blades at the ready, one hers and one given into her guardianship.
She half turned and saw Xander Harris standing there, along with Cordelia Chase and, to her surprise, Willow Rosenberg. The presence of the young redhead caught her off guard, and she knew that her secret was probably out to some extent. "What are you doing here?"
Cordelia Chase’s normally beautiful eyes were flashing with anger. "Answer the fucking question," she snapped, glaring at her. "Are you going to kill that son of a bitch or not!"
She tensed as she realized that they knew why she was stalking him. She also realized that it was likely that they’d been searching for him as well. She knew that they had powerful magic at their disposal, so it really didn’t surprise her when she thought about it.
But she turned instead to look at the soulless one lying there. She had come here to end his existence but she knew…
She looked at the ground and croaked, "I can’t."
She could almost feel the anger rising from the trio of teenagers, two of whom had offered her their friendship. Friendship she still regretted not taking when she’d had the chance.
It was Xander Harris, his voice just as anger filled but with greater control, who asked her, "Why not?"
She stared at the vampire for several moments, not daring to answer and reveal her fears. She instead heard footsteps in the alley and saw the couple step past her and move toward the vampire. "Fine," the brown-haired woman growled, "then we’ll do it...but we’ll do it my way."
"Please…" she whispered, catching their attention. Both of them looked at her with anger and wariness. She couldn’t blame them. "Please, whatever you do… make it clean. Don’t…"
She felt her hands gripping the swords so hard that if she’d looked, she would have seen that they were turning white. She felt a hand rest on her shoulder and she turned to see Willow Rosenberg, whose own eyes shone with unshed tears and… understanding. <Oh Goddess…> Shawukay realized that somehow, Willow knew. Instead of shrinking away, the half-elf took the lifeline that those strange green eyes offered and choked out, "How…"
"I was at the cemetery," she answered, her voice filled with grief for the same person that Shawukay had lost. "I saw you there and…" She stopped before going on. "We know what happened. We know about you and Amy."
She couldn’t believe it. They knew. She dimly felt her hands uncurling but didn’t register her enchanted weapons falling like rain to clatter on the sidewalk. They knew. They knew who she was and why she was here.
*****
Willow saw the dam start to break inside Shaw’s eyes and couldn’t help but feel the feelings Shaw was trying to control and make sense of. She’d been invisible, only ten feet away, when Shaw had shown up to spill her guts to Amy.
She also knew why Shaw, whose history she was still trying to make some sense of, couldn’t take the vamp out herself. Because she didn’t know if it would be saving someone’s life down the road, or getting even for killing Amy.
Shaw just couldn’t bring herself to come near that line again.
"We feel the same way," she quietly said, trying to keep Shaw from watching Xander and Cordy do what she couldn’t do. "We lost someone we love too."
That broke whatever the new girl had left, whatever was keeping her from just curling up into a ball and bawling her heart out for hours on end like she’d been doing for a couple days. She started shaking her head and trying to say something, probably about how sorry she was.
Willow already knew and did the first thing that came to mind. The same thing she’d been doing with Cordy, Buffy, Xander, and even Amy’s little sisters. She opened up her arms and gave someone they didn’t even know but who was worse off than they, something she didn’t have otherwise; a shoulder to cry on for as long as she needed. As she comforted the new girl, Willow spied her dark-haired sister pad toward the fallen vampire and wondered how she would finish off the creature.
*****
The vampire moaned as the Dark Amazon and her lover approached. Then he recovered his senses, shifted to his human appearance and tried to look as pathetic as he possibly could. "Th-thank God you showed up!" he stammered. "That crazy bitch tried to kill me! I think I need a doc—" He was cutoff in mid-sentence by the toe of Cordelia’s reinforced boot staving in his right side and sending him flying into a nearby brick wall.
"Shut up!" As she stalked toward him, she said in a careful and deadly voice, "Don’t say a fucking word! You killed our friend, you prick. That was a big, big mistake. Just so you know, you’re going to die, but it won’t be quick and it won’t be clean. It’s gonna involve people even demon’s fear, a pissed off gypsy Hellbitch and a man who used demons as playthings, and it’s gonna really, really hurt." Then she reached down, gripped the front of his shirt and leaned her face over his. "I just wanted you to know so when you wake up you’ll appreciate the trouble we went to--to give you a taste of our pain, you undead piece of shit!" Then she slammed her right fist into his face three times and knocked it unconscious.
Cordelia straightened and said to Xander, "Help me put him in the car. We’re taking him to Jenny and Giles."
Just then, Cordelia felt something tickle her mind. She turned and locked her gaze with Willow’s.
She heard her friend’s throaty voice in her mind. <What are they going to do?>
<They’ll strap him down. Then they’re going to intravenously feed diluted holy water into his veins. It should keep him in agony for hours before it kills him.>
She heard her soft-spoken sister’s gasp in her thoughts. <Torture? Oh, no…please, God, no…>
<It’s for the best, Willow. Giles says it’ll make the bad guys think twice about doing something like this to one of us ever again. Whatever you do, promise me you’ll never tell Xander or Buffy the whole ugly truth about this.> She paused, halting their advance toward the car, kissed Xander softly on his cheek, and when he turned to look at her with a pleasantly surprised expression, she mouthed the words, "I love you." Then she continued her silent conversation with the little red witch. <I don’t want Buffy to ever hate Giles and I never want Xander to lose his innocence.>
She could see all of Willow’s emotions play across her pixie-like face, her fear, her anxiety, her grief, and her love as Willow comforted the weeping woman. Then, she saw the final, all-encompassing look of the Red Witch’s resolve as she stared into Cordelia’s eyes. Willow nodded once, and with that, Cordelia released the breath that she hadn’t even realized she’d held and helped her lover drag her sister’s murderer to meet his well-deserved fate.