Author: Tim Knight
Title: Hellmouth Mode
Copyright: May 2002
Rating: PG-13 (fight scenes, language, description of bad stuff)
Spoilers: Buffy:
Season 2 until Phases. Specific Episodes, Anything With Dawn or Tara.
Highlander: Season 5 until Season finale. Richie Ryan lives.
Keywords: Buffy/ Highlander/ The Mode Series by Piers Anthony/ And other stuff I'm not giving hints on.
Summary: It's quite simple. One of the two gangs that have more frequent flyer
miles under their belts from dimensional travel than Section Seven finds themselves stranded on the Hellmouth. They get into a
fight and meet our beloved heroes, who have to try and find a way for the Moders (hey, can you think of a better name!) to
continue on their journey. But for once, it might not be as simple as, "It's a Hellmouth thing."
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 characters Shaw Hunter, Ulric Johansen, Brenna, and Sharillon
are mine. Anyone wishing to use them may contact me at doobytim@aol.com.
The characters Steven St. Wolf, Frank Iverson, Joe N'Gato, Randi
Jessup, Brian Jessup, and the concept of the Spirit Guardians are property of Steve Pantovich, as is the universe in which this
story takes place. Steve can be contacted at Steve711@concentric.net.
The characters of Robin Goodfellow, Liam Danahure, and Lauren are
property of Mike Weyer. Mike may be contacted at SWERJ321@aol.com.
The characters of Colene, Darius, Nona, Seqiro, and Burgess are property of Piers Anthony and are used without permission.
Author's Notes: This story takes place in July of 2000, during
the time period that would be between the end of Buffy's Season 4 and the beginning of Season 5. For the Mode series by Piers
Anthony, this takes place sometime during Chaos Mode. Since it was mentioned that there might be alternate versions of the
characters traveling along other Virtual Modes, I'll let you decide if these are the "real things" or their duplicates from any
number of alternate realities.
Dedications:
To Steve,
Grand High Poobah of the Wandererverse, for putting us on this whole dimensional travel thing. But for once, the Scoobies get to stay in their own universe.
To Rebekah, who in any reality is the Mistress of Red Ink, who shall prove that the crimson pen can wipe out any sword stroke I put to type.
To Mike, for introducing Robin, and Liam to the Wandererverse.
Here are the changes from your regular shows:
Buffy:
1. Due to her drowning death at the hands of the Master, Buffy is Immortal.
2. Passion and Becoming never took place, so Jenny and Kendra are still alive and well.
Kendra is attending UC Sunnydale. Jenny and Giles live together and are engaged if not married by this point.
3. Faith is a good kid, and living with Joyce and Buffy.
4. Xander and Cordelia are still together. Xander moved out of his parents' home in
early 1999 after it was revealed that Mr. Harris wasn't his father. Rather, Xander is the son of one Nick Fury. Cordelia lost her
money because of that bothersome tax thing, but lives with Xander, and her father understands.
5. Willow and Oz are still together and living in their own apartment. Oz has control of
his changes except during nights of the full moon.
6. Willow has a magical sword
given to her by an elven fighter/wizard. The sword has the spirit of a female warrior trapped inside of it, but she can possess
Willow's body if Willow is knocked unconscious or has her mind taken over. Also, Willow is unlikely to go to the Dark Side of Witchcraft.
7. Amy is still blonde and has never spent time in a Habittrail. Nor has she fallen under the spell of a magical drug pusher.
8. Tara is in Sunnydale, but is
not seeing Willow. Seems she might still have a crush on Faith, who saved her the night she arrived in Sunnydale. However, she's
currently involved with a witch named Lauren.
9. Joyce is still alive and has no plans of dying in the near future. She's dating Zev. He's an alien. Nuff said.
Sunnydale, California
<<Or What Passes For It>>
Eleven Universes To Our "Left"
12 July 2000
//I can sense many minds in the distance. //
Colene glanced at Seqiro and made a face. "Stop showing off, Horseface." She smiled at her horse, but still, she sometimes felt jealous that her own developing telepathy wasn't as good as his. She felt the stallion starting to say something but she cut him off. <I know, I know. It takes time and practice. You've been telepathic all your life; I've been telepathic… what, five or six weeks?>
//Something like that, Girlface. // came his loving response.
"Right," she sighed. The fourteen year old looked at her companions, who were just now coming through the reality barrier. Darius led the way, followed by Nona and Burgess. "You heard?"
She didn't really need to ask, but still, she was more comfortable speaking her words than just relying on the silent, telepathic connection between them.
Her new husband nodded. "We heard. But are they hostile?"
//Some are, some are not. Many are indifferent. There are human minds, and some that are not. // Seqiro shook his mane, indicating that something was making him uncomfortable. // There is something about this area that does not feel right. It is like. . . as if something is unbalancing the area's natural order. It is a disturbance. . . //
". . . in the Force, Master?" Colene snickered. The horse drew on more than their intelligence when in contact with them. "We get the point." She turned to the others in the little group. "Okay, what do we do?"
"What are our options?" Nona asked. She might be the most powerful of the group overall, but she wasn't a strategic thinker and could be a little naïve when it came to the larger world. Or worlds.
Colene shrugged. "We've got a few options. Stay in one of these emptier realities," she said, looking around the landscape that she recognized as somewhere in the Southwestern United States. "We can move closer to the populated ones and take our chances there; there's no shelter here. Or we can go to the populated ones and see if the natives are friendly."
There was a danger in that; many realities had natives who were decidedly not friendly. But there had been worlds where they had friends; Nona's universe of Julia and her own world of Oria, that universe's version of Earth, Darius' reality, and Provos' world. The problem was, Darius' reality was the one they were trying to get back to.
<Stupid mind predator,> she thought disgustedly. She felt Darius' hands on her shoulders, his concern coming through their mental link. "I'm okay, Darius. I just want to get this over with."
"As do I," the Cyng of Hlahtar, or King of Laughter as Colene called him, said tenderly. "We will make it, Colene. Don't worry."
"Right. With God knows how many realities between us and your reality, we'll be lucky to make it in one piece. Or even two."
She couldn't help it; she always expected the worst. <That's what happens when you live my life. . . > She shook her head to expel the negative thoughts. "Seqiro, you said there were friendly minds in realities ahead?"
//In some. Some of them in this stretch seem to be sparsely populated, or to have the hostile minds more concentrated than we have seen in other realities. //
Nona asked, "Can you find a specific reality where the friendly minds are greater in number?"
Colene smacked herself on the forehead. "Why didn't I think of that?"
//Nona's question is a good one, Colene. It will take a bit of time to focus, but it will be unlikely that I can read the minds I am feeling. Rather, I will only be able to determine their natures. // Seqiro's ambience faded as he started to concentrate on that task.
Colene glanced at Nona and gave her a thumb's up. When the sorceress frowned in confusion due to her lack of knowledge of Earth gestures, Colene broadcast with her own limited mental powers. // Thumb's up. It means, good job in this case. // Nona smiled and blushed a bit.
Colene laughed and walked over to Burgess. She laid a hand on one of his contact points and beamed to him. // Seqiro's checking out realities to see which might be friendly. We'll try to find shelter there. //
But will they be willing to accept me? Burgess' thought asked her, worry in his mind. I do not want to be separated from the hive.
"They take all of us or none of us, Bugface. We're a package deal."
She then had to spend the next three minutes explaining the phrase, "package deal." "Next time we get a break, I'm teaching you and Nona basic Earth phrases."
Burgess indicated he would like that. Colene laughed in response. "It's a deal."
She stood up as she felt the mental net created by her horse coming back on. She turned and immediately asked, "So what's the verdict, Seqiro?"
//I have determined which reality has the most friendly minds, but I still feel that strangeness in the area. None of you can feel it? //
"Nope, not here. And I'm the only other telepath." She glanced at her husband. "Darius?"
"I feel something, but nothing hostile. That may change as we get closer to this reality Seqiro favors." He did seem to think of something else, though. "Seqiro, can you determine if the reality we are approaching is technological or magical in nature?"
//I can only sense that my powers will work there, nothing more. //
"Well, it's the best of a lot of not so good choices," Colene decided. She shrugged. "In for a penny, in for a pound. Let's go see what's up in that reality." She glanced at her companions. "Darius, you and me will go first. Nona, you'll back us up. That way, if it's a human world, they'll see us first. Nona, get your magic ready."
Nona nodded as she and her husband walked forward, penetrating the barrier and passing through yet another reality.
<I hope we don't regret this. . .>
//I heard that, Girlface! //
<Shut up, Seqiro!>
Sunnydale Cemetery
Sunnydale, California
<<Or What Passes For It>>
One Universe To Our "Left"
12 July 2000
"Please tell me we are not going to be sleeping in a graveyard!" Colene demanded. "Seqiro, this is your brilliant idea?"
//I did not know of the features in these realities, Colene, // he apologized. // We can always go back to the reality we paused at. //
"Yeah, right. No shelter against the weather." She sighed. "Of course, we could always move onward. What's in the realities ahead?"
//To use one of your phrases, ‘more of the same,' only the friendly minds are more concentrated here. They seem to taper off the further we move away, however. It is almost as if this reality is a focal point of some sort. Almost like an anchor reality. //
"I get it," she said with a thoughtful smile. "It's like an ebb and flow effect. Certain realities might be more ‘focused' than others. The one we're about to pop into is the ‘strongest' in friendly minds, right?"
//That is what I said, // Seqiro said with false frustration.
Colene and Nona laughed. Colene steeled herself to lead the way into the reality they had voted to stay the night in. "Okay, here goes nothing."
Colene stepped through at the same time as Darius, summoning up her own telepathy to beam a call for help should it be necessary.
Sunnydale Cemetery
Sunnydale, California
<<The Wandererverse We All Know And Love>>
12 July 2000
"More of the same, only emphasis on ‘more,'" Colene said with a fearful shiver. "God, Darius, this reality's got a lot more than the last one."
"More what, Colene?" her love asked her.
She shuddered again. "Graves," she whispered, as if speaking louder might disturb the dead. "I'm not sensing anything, so tell them to come on through."
"I think Seqiro already knows that."
She turned away from her reluctant watch to see Nona and the horse appearing out of nowhere. They moved to the side so Burgess could come through; while traveling the Virtual Mode, travelers passed into new realities every ten feet or so. It wasn't an exact measurement, but it was close enough.
The Cambrian life form floated through the barrier between the last reality and this one. His three eyestalks rotated and saw that there was no danger nearby, so he settled down on the ground to await the others' decision as how to proceed.
"This is Earth, at least," Colene muttered. "I mean, the tombstones are in English. Look," she said, pointing at one of them. She read the name engraved on the stone, then the dates. "Oh my God. She was only fifteen when she died."
"Colene, don't worry. We can protect ourselves."
"Can we?" she said, suddenly remembering that in certain realities, their varying abilities didn't work as well, if at all. "Nona! Can you work your magic?"
"I already tried illusion," the eighteen year old told her. She flashed that too beautiful smile at her. "As well as compaction and enlargement. My magic works in full here."
"On Earth? Seqiro?"
//I believe my telepathy will work sufficiently here, Colene. // The horse looked around. // But I can still feel that strangeness. //
"Is it something that can screw us over?" the teenager asked.
//I do not know. It is not like the mind predator, but it is still. . . tangible, for lack of a better term. But like Colene theorized, the disturbance is strongest here. This is, as she coined the term, the ‘strongest' reality. //
Colene sighed. <Damned if you do, damned if you don't.> "Well, at least we know that if something happens, we can just. . ." She started walking forward to go through to the next reality. She stopped when she passed where the barrier should have been, but she didn't pass through. "Uh, guys?"
She saw that Nona had sized up the situation. The Orian woman tried to pass through the last boundary, but without success. She turned back to Colene. "We're stranded!"
"Here we go again!" Colene moaned. She glanced at Darius. "I don't suppose you could conjure us into the one of the realities we came from?"
Her magical man shook his head. "No. If we are ‘stuck' in this reality, it would do no good. I cannot cross dimensions with my sympathetic magic unless we are on the actual Virtual Mode."
"Then why didn't we feel the change?!?" she demanded. "We should have felt something!"
//Perhaps it is not something to do with the Virtual Mode, // Seqiro suggested. // Just as the Animus in Nona's reality interfered with the anchor there. //
Colene glanced at Nona, who nodded in agreement. They'd been stranded in the Julia universe for two weeks when Nona accepted her anchor. Only after realigning her world's magical flow by invoking the Anima, the source of Nona's magic, had they been able to resume their journey.
"Please tell me we aren't about to go on another ‘save the world' jag!" the younger woman snapped, her voice filled to the brim with sarcasm. "That was hard enough when we knew what to do, thanks to Provos knowing the future."
"Perhaps we should think of a course of action after we rest," Darius suggested. "We have traveled hard today."
"No kidding," Colene shot back, more harshly than she'd intended. She gave Darius her pouty look. "Sorry, Darius."
He moved up and hugged her close. "Apology accepted. I know you're not comfortable in this burial place."
"Yeah." She considered that. "Wait a minute. If we're really stuck here, maybe we can find some help." She pushed away from him and focused on her horse. "Seqiro! Can you, like, focus on those friendly minds? Maybe track them down and some of us can get a safe place to stay the night? It'd beat sleeping out in the open!"
//I could do so, yes. Should I focus on finding the friendliest minds, or try to find the closest, that we might find shelter with some expediency? //
"Maybe both. If someone's more open minded than another person, the better." She smiled at having a course of action. "Let's boogey."
"Boogey?" Nona asked. "What. . ."
"God, I'm definitely teaching you Earth speak. I wish someone else had this problem…"
The Mode travelers were making their way to what Colene hoped would be the exit from the cemetery. More than once she'd shivered at the sheer number of markers that she and her group were passing.
<God. If this many people are dead, how many can still be alive?> she asked. <Not sure I want to know that answer.>
//There are hostile minds approaching! // Seqiro beamed to the group. // They are completely hostile! //
"Can you read them?" Darius asked, moving to the equipment mounted on the horse's back and pulling out his sword.
//No. They have closed minds. And they are different from humans. But they know we are here and are moving with hostile intent. //
"Great. . ." Colene snarled. She started reaching for the knife she carried. It was actually for cleaning out Seqiro's hooves, but in a pinch she was fair to middling with cutting things. <Usually my wrist, but not anymore.> "Say Horseface, can you do that Charles Atlas thing on me? The whole strength, speed, killer instinct package."
//I can. I think I should keep it to you though, for Darius has a weapon and Nona has her magic. //
"Good plan. Now let me take care of Burg." She ran over and touched one of Burgess' contact points. "Burg, you have any rocks left in your belly?"
He indicated that he had more than enough for a lengthy fight, which he picked up through her communication. She beamed that she wanted him to float around the edges of the fight, providing fire support for them. The floater agreed and started moving off with an audible "whoosh" of air expulsion.
"Okay, Snail Face's going to be our long range gun. Nona, we're going to try and bluff them to avoid a fight. Don't fry them until we don't have a choice, got it?"
"I understand." Her voice trembled a bit, but Colene knew that in a pinch, Nona would do her best.
<That's all we need. Seqiro, if you can, stun them if they don't play nice.>
//I will try. // came the reply.
<That's all I ask, Horsey.> Colene watched as a group of twelve or so guys and girls walked into view, blocking what she now saw was the exit from the graveyard. But she was puzzled; Seqiro had said they were different from normal humans, but they were human! They looked like normal, everyday people.
Again, the horse reiterated, // Their minds are somehow different. They are not what they seem. And they are decidedly not friendly. //
One of the men, dressed in regular clothes, smiled at them without any trace of goodwill. "Well, well, well. What do we have here? You're out late for kids your age, aren't you?"
"We're just passing through," Colene said. < Hey, it's the truth!> "What about you guys? Aren't you out late, too?"
"Oh no," a young woman only a little older than Nona snidely remarked. "This is our time, honey." She gave Darius a hungry look that really pissed Colene off. "I want that one!"
"Hey, get your eyes off my man, girlie!" she shouted.
The group of people seemed shocked at her proclamation. One by one, they started laughing at her. The man who seemed to be in charge growled, "Oh, that's just too rich, kiddo! I think we can use someone like you in our group. Maybe for comic relief!" He focused on her and said, "We'll turn them all."
<Turn?> Colene barely thought before one of the ugliest sights she'd witnessed since beginning her journey on the Virtual Mode took place.
In rapid fashion, every single one of the people in the group blocking their escape began to change. Their faces became distorted; ridges formed over their eyes, their eyes became yellow and sickly, and their teeth lengthened into sharp, pointed things.
"Get them!" their leader shouted, leading the charge.
<NONA!> Colene shouted in her mind.
The signal was barely given when a fireball burst into existence out of nowhere. The ugly boys charging them came up short in front, but that only prompted others to circle around to surround the Mode travelers.
"Seqiro, do your thing!"
She waited for one of the creatures to approach her, as did her husband. One of the creatures let out a yelp and fell to the ground. <That's one for the home team! Way to go, Horseface!>
Nona was busily concentrating on another fireball. This one burst to their right, cutting off the creatures again.
But it also removed another direction for them to flee in, should it become necessary. "Nona, fry the things!"
"But they are living creatures! I cannot kill someone like that!"
<For God's sake. . .> Any further curses were made moot as one of the things came after her.
Colene started to feel a clutch of fear, but felt Seqiro's power dampen it as he also started enhancing her abilities. The idea was simple; he took control of her instincts and reflexes while working on her brain's systems, raising her physical attributes to their maximum limits. Frequent or long use would leave the person fatigued for a long time, but in the short term, it could mean the difference between life and death.
The creature charged her, eyes flashing and fangs dripping with saliva. Colene, her skills guided by her beloved horse, stabbed right for the thing's heart. With the sick sound of ribs being splintered, the hoof knife hit its target perfectly. Colene ripped the knife back out, expecting her molester to drop to the ground.
Instead, he laughed at her, sending chills running up and down her spine. <What the. . .> Her thought was cut off as he grabbed her and brought her forward, like he was preparing to bite her.
A scream from Darius startled her and froze her attacker. The gleam of moonlight reflecting off of steel flashed in Colene's field of vision before the monster holding her fast screamed. He released her and backed away, holding his arm.
What chilled Colene even more was the lack of blood showing in the wound.
"What the heck are these things?" she whispered as Darius moved to protect her. She watched as the things started to overcome their hesitance caused by Nona's magic. She shouted, "Nona, fry them!"
"But. . ." she said before one of the things, having snuck up behind her, grabbed her. She screamed but it wasn't necessary; the creature stiffened as a "crack" sounded. He dropped and she moved closer to them, trying to guard their backs.
"You're going to die slow for that, girly!" their leader shouted. "I don't know what you are, but you're going to make a great addition to my bed, sweetie."
"Over my dead body," Nona snarled. Colene knew she understood the English because of her understanding it.
The thing didn't understand her, but apparently didn't care. He turned to his lackeys. "Don't just stand there, you idiots! Rush them!"
Mustering their courage, the eleven other really ugly things started moving forward, albeit more cautiously.
Colene wished they were moving in the other direction. "Guys, get ready to run."
"But we cannot leave. . ."
As the guys in serious need of plastic surgery started moving into a rush, that was when things got even scarier.
Sunnydale Cemetery
Sunnydale, California
12 July 2000
Colene watched as one of the creatures was suddenly struck by what she could only call a lightning bolt. The thing got hit right in the chest, was thrown back, and promptly burst into flames, letting out a shriek of the truly damned as the fires began consuming him even as small arcs of electricity continued to play over his body.
Colene lost the fight against her instincts; she turned around and saw a group of creatures rapidly approaching her group. Rather than being the same, these three were different from each other; one was a girl who looked human enough, but the arcing electricity in her right hand carried made Colene way nervous. The other girl was even shorter than Colene, but that was where the similarities ended. For one thing, Colene didn't have glowing red eyes or fiery orange hair! Their friend, if such a tag applied, looked like a running dog on two legs!
"What the heck. . ." she said before turning back to the group actively attacking the hive. She saw one of the creatures coming at her and on reflex, swung her knife forward. It rammed into his eyeball, making him shriek in agony. "Great, we're being saved by Xena and Scooby Doo!"
"Who? You know them?" Darius asked as he swung his sword at another of the things, cutting through her jeans and into her leg. She stumbled a bit but didn't go down.
<What the Hell are these things?!?> Colene said, nearing a panic. "Nona, blast the suckers dammit!"
This time, Nona realized that mundane skills were nowhere near enough. She quickly conjured up another fireball and this time, three of the creatures were caught at ground zero.
The other trio of beings ran past them to engage their attackers, giving the Mode travelers space to recover. While she was totally freaked by the sight of Wolf Boy jumping at the creatures like some crazy animal, she was surprised when the human-looking girl, a redhead a few years older than her, flashed her a smile. She tossed something Colene's way and she caught it on reflex as the teenager passed her by and pulled out a short sword that glowed with an eerie light.
<What is she smiling about? These things are way nasty!> However, Colene was able to put two and two together. <Sharp pointy thing + light show on pointy part = magic. >
The girl, red hair flying about as she stopped, swung her shining blade at one of the things. Colene said, "Gross!" when that sword cut through the creature's arm and sent it flying into the distance. The girl followed up with a spin kick that made Colene think of Xena and Gabrielle. It was effective; it spun the thing's head around. Colene could hear the smack of her hiking boot against its jaw.
The other girl, the nonhuman one, started chanting and waving her hands around. Colene didn't recognize the language, but she had a pretty good idea of what was about to happen.
<Magic time.>
The kid, assuming that's what she was, held a hand out toward a creature attacking her. Her hand lit up and a bolt of energy flew out and struck the creature. It was only staggered, but the girl drew a sword of her own and swung out, taking the creature in the chest. Before the telepath could cry out that it wouldn't work, the creature vanished in a cloud of DUST?!?
"Oh sure, it works for her!" Colene moaned at the unfairness of it all. She watched as the creatures attacking them were forced back and started to back up. "What the Heck. . ."
"It's the Slayer!" one of the girls shouted. "It's that Slayer bitch!"
<Slayer? Not a good name. Why couldn't it be ‘Knight' or ‘Hero?' You know God, I'd love to see a guy with blue underwear and a big old "S" plastered on his chest jumping into this fight right about now. Hell, I'd even settle for Mighty Mouse!>
Colene glanced at Darius and said, "What's worse? Getting attacked or getting caught in the middle of a turf war?"
"I'm fairly sure neither solution is preferable," he said, moving up to guard both Colene and the little girl who'd taken up a spot to guard them.
As the creatures started to retreat despite their leader's shouts to the contrary, things took an even more "interesting" turn. The ugly guys turning tail found the exit blocked by someone, or something, on a horse! Colene made out the same red eyes as Shorty Girl who'd stopped in front of them and said, "Great. Remind me again whose idea it was to get us stranded in this reality!"
//You agreed to the plan, // Seqiro thought as he turned around and kicked one of the things in the face with his rear legs. The thing screeched in pain and clutched at his ruined face.
<Hell, it's an improvement. . .> "Looks to me like we might be worse off, Seqiro." As the rider and her mount started charging the panicking creatures, the leader, who was more ticked than frightened, confronted Colene. "Oh shit."
"I couldn't have said it better myself, girlie!" he shouted. Darius tried to block his path, but the fiend just threw a backhanded punch, knocking Darius aside with brutal power.
"Darius!" Colene shouted as the thing moved to grab her.
Suddenly a voice sounded in her head, a voice that was female and most definitely not Seqiro's! // The heart! Aim for the heart! //
She belatedly realized that the voice had spoken to Seqiro as well as her. It was his mental powers guiding her instincts as she stabbed out with whatever it was she'd been tossed, the smooth feeling of wood still present, albeit forgotten, in her hand. It sank into the spot between his lungs with an impressive impact. Not expecting it to work, Colene was stunned when the creature suddenly disintegrated into nothingness, covering her with a thick layer of foul smelling dust.
Colene started wiping her eyes to clear her vision. <Don't want to end up dead!> Upon regaining her sight, she watched the horse rider swinging a glowing sword and taking these things through their necks. "Ewwwwww!"
//They are saving us, Colene, // Seqiro pointed out.
"I know that! But still! Ewwwww!"
In short order, the foursome (if one didn't count the horse) had made short work of the dorky dozen. Colene called to Burgess, hoping he'd get the gist and come on in. "Might as well see what we're in for," she told the others. As the floater came up to what he'd termed the "hive," the rider dismounted and joined her friends. "Seqiro, can you get into their minds?"
//I could with some effort, but the female riding what appears to be a horse would be alerted. She has a block against my telepathy. She may have felt my scans already. //
<But I can read her emotions,> Darius protested. Colene met his glance; he was still groggy from the attack, she could see that. <She is concerned about her companions, especially the short one. But she seems more protective than worried. She is radiating love for them. So I think they might be benign.>
"We'll see," Colene muttered. "But assuming they speak English, at least we'll be able to communicate."
"Here they come," Nona said. Colene could tell she was ready to use more magic at the drop of a hat.
Colene watched as the quartet walked up, the "horse" walking up behind them. She swallowed and started to move forward but stopped when the rider, who shared the short girl's shining eyes, stopped and gazed at them intently for several seconds.
After a bit, she turned to the redheaded fighter and started speaking in a fluid, musical tongue. The girl, who Colene guessed to be about eighteen, seemed confused at first but eventually nodded. She spoke back to the other in the same tongue, but it seemed like she wasn't as fluent as Staring Girl.
The women turned back to Colene and her group. Since they called her the leader, she stepped forward and said, "Uh… hi."
The woman cocked her head a bit, seeming not to understand.
"Great," she muttered. She decided to do the name thing. She pointed at herself. "Colene." She glanced at the others and thought, <Seqiro, are they good guys?>
//They are not hostile, but they are protected from casual probes. Try giving your names and talking. If they are open-minded, I might be able to make some progress into their minds. //
Colene pointed at herself again. "Colene." She pointed at her horse. "Seqiro." She pointed at Bug Boy and grinned, hoping that her cheery appearance might make a difference. "Burgess."
Darius and Nona, realizing the exchange for what it was, introduced themselves as well. Colene watched as the woman stared at Nona and said something that sounded familiar, yet different.
Nona appeared startled and said, "Yes, this is my native language. How do you speak it?"
With a noticeable accent, the woman said (translated through Nona's understanding), "I speak many languages. On this world, we call your tongue Gaelic."
"This is amazing!" Nona said, smiling at the woman and then at the "hive." "We can communicate with them, Colene!"
"It's a start," she said, feeling relieved at the good start. "It'd be nice if they spoke English though." She smiled at that, wondering what Redeye in front of her would make of it.
She shocked Colene by staring back at her and saying, "How nice would it be?"
Colene's jaw dropped; she was certain Darius copied her action. "Y-y-you speak English?!?"
"Being a Scottish Highlander, I would hope so," came her response. Colene could just imagine that the woman was smiling over her shock. "Now perhaps we can cease this, ‘Me Tarzan, You Jane,' routine and talk like normal people?"
"You? Normal? Riiiight."
"Colene," Darius said with a mix of fatigue and fear, "do you need to antagonize people who carry enchanted weapons and use magic?"
She grimaced. "Good point." She glanced back at the shiny-eyed woman. "Sorry."
"It is all right." She concentrated and said, "Shirak." Colene jumped as a globe of light burst into existence above them.
"Huh. Not bad. Is it illusion or real?"
"Real. Now, shall we finish the ‘ritual' of introductions?" she said with that trace of amusement.
Colene glared at her. "Sure. Let's." She noticed that Doggy was shrinking and said, "What is he doing?"
The redhead smiled at her. "Changing back."
<I just know we're going to regret this.> "Whatever. Let's get the names out of the way and get out of here." She looked at the coating of dust covering her clothes. "And what the heck were those. . . things?"
"We can discuss that later." The woman who'd talked to Nona smiled and pointed to herself. "Now for introductions. Shaw Madison Hunter, born in Scotland but now living in America." She pointed to the others in turn. The first was the green-eyed redhead, who smiled in friendly greeting. "Willow Rosenburg of Sunnydale, California." Then came the dog turned into a guy, who was really skinny! "Oz Green, Willow's boyfriend." Last came the smiling and giggling kid with the now-amber eyes and… pointed ears!! "Lastly, Soraka Redstar of Evereska. She and her parents are visiting us from their homeworld, which I think you can appreciate."
Colene fixed her stunned gaze on the woman calling herself Hunter. "How. . ."
The teenager just shook her head. "Shaw, stop teasing her. Sorry, but Shaw's got a whacked sense of humor. Comes from hanging with Robin and Liam." She switched her sword to her left hand and held a hand out. "Let's just say we've got some experience in dimension stuff. We can talk more later, but right now we need to get out of here and report in."
"Report in to whom?" Colene asked, suspicious.
//Colene, I sense no hostile intent from them. // Seqiro's voice told her and surely the others.
That female voice rang in her head. // Not that you could stop them if they had hostile intent. But since you're not vampires, you get a lot of brownie points from the start. //
Colene froze at that. She stared at Willow. "Who's the girl in my head?" she demanded.
Shaw turned around and said, "Sharillon!"
Her horse nodded and Hunter turned back to her. "I apologize. My steed's sense of humor is almost as bad as mine."
"Great. But who are you. . ."
"Later. We need to go before more vampires show up," the guy named Oz said with a blank expression.
"Wait a minute!" Colene shared looks with the others and focused on Willow. She was human, so she felt safer asking her. "What are you talking about, vampires?!?"
The sword-wielding redhead smiled and nodded at what she'd tossed to Colene when she'd first shown up. "What else turns to dust when you shove a wooden stake through his heart?"
Colene stiffened and finally looked at the thing she'd shoved through her attacker's chest. Sure enough, it was a slim, wooden stake, about eight inches long, and sharpened on one end. She started stammering and glanced at the human girl, praying she was kidding. "Please tell me you're joking!"
"I wish," she said with rolling eyes.
Colene looked at Darius and said four words. "We are so screwed."
The girl named Willow nodded. "We know the feeling. Welcome to the Hellmouth."
Sunnydale Cemetery
Sunnydale,
California
12 July 2000
"Wait a minute," the girl called Colene demanded. "What the heck is a Hellmouth?"
"We don't have time for that right now," Willow said while Oz and the others scanned the area for any signs of further trouble. "We need to get out of here and get you to our headquarters."
"Your what?" the younger girl snapped. "We're not going anywhere with you guys!"
"Colene," the cute guy started to speak, but she shrugged him off.
The girl's body tensed up and her eyes flashed. "Just because you helped us doesn't mean you can order us around. We've got to move."
//You're stranded here, remember? // Sharillon's voice sounded in Willow's head, and presumably the girl's, as well, by the way her fists clenched.
The red witch sighed. "Look. . . Colene, is it? From what little we've heard or guessed, you're not even from this Earth, let alone local. It's probably something to do with the Hellmouth that got you stuck here. If you come with us, we can talk about it and maybe find you a way home. And the best place to do that is our headquarters." She pointed at the piles of dust on the ground for emphasis. "And if we come across any more vamps, you can help us out."
She waited as the girl, who appeared to be in charge of this group at no more than fourteen, turned to the others in her party; the guy, the older girl, the horse, and that. . . floating snail thingy.
<Why did I have to get patrol duty tonight?> she asked herself.
<Okay, now what?> Colene asked the group at large through Seqiro's telepathic loop. She suppressed a twinge of anxiety. <Seqiro, can you keep that other horse out of our heads?>
//Done. Sharillon's telepathy is not as powerful as mine. //
<Thanks.> The leader of the hive turned to Darius. <Darius, what do you think we should do?>
Her husband frowned. <Our options would appear to be limited, Colene. If these people truly wish to help us, and it appears that they do if my ability to detect emotion is working properly here, they may be able to help us get back onto the Virtual Mode. We should take them up on their offer if they are sincere.>
Colene mentally shook her head. <But can we trust them?>
//We can, // the horse's voice sounded. He seemed very sure of himself. // I am sure of myself. I can detect nothing but a desire to help us, except for the amusement over your reactions from Sharillon and the girl named Soraka. //
<Great,> Colene sighed.
Nona's voice entered the conversation. <Colene, whatever those things were, we would have been overwhelmed by them if not for these rescuers. Perhaps we should at least see if they could offer us some way to continue journeying.>
Colene couldn't argue that too drastically, but there was one opinion she wanted before deciding. She knelt over Burgess and placed her hands over two of his contact points. <What do you think, Burg?> she asked, using her own newborn telepathy to augment their discussion.
Their actions were beneficial to us, the floater relayed. If they can help us continue on our journey, then contact with this hive should continue.
<Okay, Airface. I know when I'm outvoted,> she grumbled. She stood up and faced the redhead with the gleaming short sword. "Okay, we'll go with you for now. But Burgess and Seqiro need to be out of sight." <You won't get all of us.>
Willow turned to the taller of the two red-eyed girls. "Shaw?"
That one faced the other horse. "Sharillon, can you take them somewhere safe and with easy access?"
The mare turned her head toward Seqiro and stared for a second. Colene assumed they were communicating mentally. She then turned and trotted off, with him following. Burgess ignited his air cushion and sped off after them.
//The place she is taking us is safe, according to Sharillon, // the stallion beamed to her. // She says the ground is. . . consecrated, and that you would understand what that means. //
Colene blinked and nodded distractedly. She sent her own telepathic confirmation. // Remember our talk on religion? You can get it from that. //
A burst of satisfaction laden with love registered in her mind and she sighed. She glanced at the redhead and her face went blank. "Now what?"
Willow gave the strangers a bright smile. "Now we take you somewhere you can rest and get some munchies. Then we can find out how to get you back on whatever dimension trip you were on."
The girl in charge bristled at Willow's attitude. "Oh, you have experience with magic, telepathy, and traveling through alternate universes?"
Willow glanced at her boyfriend and fellow warriors. "Do you want to tell her, or can I do it?"
"Go ahead," Oz said with that tiny smile that made her tingly all over.
"Okay," she chirped. She turned back to the three new humans. "Magic? I cast that lightning bolt into the vampire. I'm a practicing Wicca. Telepathy? Sharillon is. And alternate realities?" Her smile became mischievous. "I met my double from an alternate reality who's a bisexual good girl vampire with a leather fetish."
The three peoples' jaws dropped and Willow heard Soraka giggling. She turned to the older two and waved for them to start moving. "Let's go. We need to get somewhere safe."
She moved forward and barked orders. "Oz, you and me are point. Sara, stick with our new friends. Shaw, you're drag."
It took Nona a few seconds to get the basics of what the red-haired girl named Willow was talking about. She understood the mare being capable of what she often referred to as mind magic, and she appreciated that this Willow was what Colene called a witch, a type of spell caster like her and Darius. But it was the other things that Colene's limited telepathy put into perspective for her that frightened her.
Specifically, these creatures the natives of this world called "vampires." According to Colene's memories and knowledge of the subject from her Earth, they were supposedly just legends. They were humans, who appeared to look like living people, but were in fact dead, and had to drink blood in order to survive! That disgusted her. However, Colene apparently knew some of their weak points; holy items, fire, garlic of all things, wooden sticks through their hearts, and they could be killed by sunlight. What made Colene nervous was the fact that their impromptu guides had eliminated the vampires assaulting them with such ridiculous ease.
When she thought about it more, it made her nervous too.
The ninth of the ninth turned her head to look at the strange woman who spoke her language. <Gay-lick, she called it,> she thought, recalling the name given her native tongue in this reality. She sent a focused thought to Colene. <Can I engage this ‘Shaw' in conversation? It might gain us some information about them or this reality.>
//Go for it, // her friend shot back.
She kept walking, but looked back over her shoulder, moving some of her long, brown-black hair out of her eyes. She fought down her initial nervous reaction at seeing the woman's red eyes scanning left to right, then back again. "Why are you doing that?" she asked.
The woman kept swiveling her head in either direction. She gave Nona a short answer. "So that we are not ambushed from behind. Vampires are notoriously capable of silent movement when they wish it."
<Oh.> Nona couldn't argue that point; she'd never even imagined such monsters. "Can we talk while we are walking?"
"That depends," Shaw answered tersely. She did a quick rotation of her body, walking backwards for three or four steps before turning forward again. "If the subject is not too sensitive. After all, you never know who might be listening, magically or otherwise."
That was something Nona could understand. "I understand." <But where to start?>
Colene beamed, // How about finding out who or what she or these other guys are? //
<Thank you!> Nona glanced around, put on alert by the woman's mention of being ambushed. She kindly asked, "So what is this world like? It must be nicer than some we have visited if humans and beings like yourself fight these. . ." She stumbled because she didn't have a word for the things.
"Blood drinkers," the woman said, giving her a term to use in her language. Nona could hear some amusement in her voice. "And for your safety, you must know that the general human populace of this Earth does not know of things that people such as you or I take for granted." She chuckled. "After all, everyone ‘knows' that vampires and elves are merely ancient legends or Hollywood make believe."
"Holly. . . wood. . ."
Nona's confusion was eradicated by Colene's message. // Crap! She knows you're fishing for information! //
<What are ‘elves?'> Nona asked in return. She'd figured why Shaw stressed that word.
//Elves! You know; pointy ears, swords, magic powers? // Colene must have felt her confusion. // Fairy warriors and wizards. Some good, some bad. //
Now the Orian understood. They simply had different names for such beings, which until this moment had been mere children's tales to her. She glanced at the alert "elf." "I'm sorry, I didn't recognize the name. You are a fairy?"
"Yes and no," was the answer she got. Nona could hear the amusement in her voice.
//She's not going to be straight with you, // Colene concluded. // Never mind. //
<I want to keep trying, > Nona said; something was nagging at her. <She said people might be watching us, so she may be vague on purpose.> She slowed down a bit, hoping to walk side by side with the fairy woman.
Shaw put a hand up, palm facing her. "Please stay ahead of me. I am on duty."
<Duty?> Nona nonetheless acceded to the warrior's wishes. "I'm sorry. I was only trying to be friendly."
"There are no laws against that," she was told. Nona could see a grin touching her face, and felt herself doing the same. <Colene, do I continue?>
//Yep. // Her resignation seemed to be turning to curiosity. Nona asked Shaw, "You called this duty. Is this how you make your living?"
"Yes and no," the fighter told her. Nona felt Colene getting ready to snap at her for her strange answer, but Shaw then elaborated. "While several generations on both sides of my family have dedicated their lives to ‘fighting the good fight,' saving the world on occasion is not generally known to be financially rewarding."
"So you do this. . ."
"So that others do not have to do this." Nona blinked at the conviction in Shaw's answer, but the fairy wasn't done. "I know that for every vampire that I stop, it saves at least one life."
The sorceress couldn't believe what she was hearing. While she had changed the magical current on her home world to free it from a tyrannical regime, this woman did so because. . .
//Somebody has to do it. Like us bringing the anima to Oria. //
That was Colene's thought. Nona added her own. <Perhaps, but she said that the people of this world don't know what she or these others are doing! Everyone on Oria knows why I did what I did. But these people, our own age. . .>
She didn't have to finish. Instead, she asked Shaw, "But you do have an occupation of some sort?"
"I work at a shop owned by a husband and wife who deal in antiquities." Shaw then added, "That is common knowledge, so I need not hide it. But my priority is schooling; I start college this fall."
That reminded Nona that these people were ranging from Colene's age to her own. "I see." The magician decided to try another line of questioning. "Can I ask how you knew we were under attack?"
The woman continued her watchful staring with those red eyes, but gave Nona an answer. "I sensed something. A disruption in the balance of nature in your general location. My sensing was not exact, so we diverted from our normal patrol route to check out my feelings. In truth, we were lucky to come across your fight."
"Perhaps it was our arrival that you sensed," Nona offered. It sounded possible to her.
The irony and disagreement in the other's answer was all too evident. "Not unless your arrival caused something along the lines of a small earthquake or hurricane."
Nona's eyes widened as Colene's understanding of such things was relayed to her. "You can sense such things?"
"A natural disruption of that magnitude is hard not to sense," she laughed.
Nona smiled despite her theory being contradicted. "Then what could it have been?"
The woman shrugged, but Nona felt a memory suddenly rear itself. <Colene! Didn't Seqiro say he sensed something when we were nearing this reality?>
//Yeah. . . Hey! Maybe that's what got us stranded here and not this ‘Hellmouth' they were talking about! // Nona could imagine Colene's thoughts racing. // We'll have to bring it up whenever we get where they're taking us. //
<All right,> Nona agreed. These strangers did seem sincere in their desire to help. <But if this ‘mouth' they talked about isn't the cause of disrupting the Virtual Mode, what is?>
Colene didn't have any answers.
Bureau 13
Headquarters
Location Unknown
12 July 2000
"So are any of you people going to give me any answers?!?" Horace Gordon shouted. The sensor operators saw that their commander was livid.
It was understandable. In the space of five minutes, virtually every mid- to high-level shaman, nature priest, medicine man, witch doctor, telepath, empathy, precog, postcog, and psi-sensitive in the Bureau had called in or put their teams on alert, their senses screaming that ecological disturbances or disasters were taking place across the American landscape.
At the same time.
"Chief," Dimitri called, trotting in from his office. "I've gotten calls from four of the other eight Bureau chiefs. It's apparently happening across the globe."
"But what is happening?" Gordon demanded, his eyes flashing more than the two-star emblems adorning his collar.
"Sir, I think I have an idea!" cried Cynthia Jerrick. The third year Agent was playing with her scanners. "At least," she said, less certain than after her initial outburst, "I think it's a lead."
"It's better than nothing, Jerrick," Horace said with a civil tone. The Head of Bureau 13 stalked over and ordered, "Tell me what you found."
"Well, sir," Jerrick said, continuing to increase her system's sensitivity, "The reports are specific to a tee; natural disasters of varying size and type, occurring in the areas our people are based in. The fact that the phenomena crosses the spectrum, bridging between mystics and psychics, made me ask myself; what could these two groups have in common?"
Gordon nodded for her to continue. "Keep going, Agent."
She moved a hand and waved at her screen. "I worked with an Osage shaman last winter on a haunting near Tulsa. She has what some Native Americans call ‘Spirit Sight.'"
"I've heard of it, Agent. What does this have to do with our people reporting tidal waves where there aren't any?"
Jerrick seemed annoyed at being interrupted, but she was a professional. She evenly said, "I also remembered the movie we made about the Roberts boy in New York."
"The kid who saw dead people," Gordon nodded. "Go on."
"So, I flipped my scanners around to search for spiritual disturbances and phenomena," she finished. "Sir, there's some kind of massive disturbance on the Ethereal Plane. If my readings are right, God! It could be reverberating across multiple planes of existence. It's that big, sir, and it's causing small rips in the dimensional barriers between Earth and the Ethereal. Anything that resides on the Ethereal plane might come through or be expelled through those holes."
"Good work, Jerrick!" Gordon turned to the others in the room and started barking orders. "Notify all teams and apprise them of the situation." He looked at his aide. "Dimitri, call JP and tell him to be ready to move at a moment's notice." A second thought occurred to him and he called the centaur back. "Call the other Bureau heads, the Knight General, my father, and the US Legacy houses. Let them know what's going on. Might as well cover all the bases. If anyone or any thing comes through those holes, at least we can contain them."
Horace turned and headed toward his office, wondering what types of beings would turn up through those holes Jerrick had found.
<Who's going to visit our little corner of the multiverse this time around?> he sighed.
Sunnydale Cemetery
Sunnydale, California
12 July 2000
The man looked at the scene developing before him; three vampires trying to break into a crypt. Once again he looked up at the moon, noting the differences between it and home. With a mental shrug, he looked back at the three undead.
With a shiver at the differences he saw between this graveyard and the one he'd been in a short while ago, he tried to remember how he'd ended up here. He'd been walking through the first burial ground when the world around him seemed to come alive under his very feet. He'd heard about earthquakes of course, but now he understood the underlying horror behind the tales.
As he'd been thrown off his feet by a particularly strong tremor, the man had felt a fear like he'd never known before. That was when the light fog that blanketed the ground of the cemetery suddenly thickened, enveloping him, clouding his vision, and leaving him confused in addition to being scared. He felt a sensation of falling even though he was sitting on solid ground; his stomach recoiled, his ears suddenly popped, and he felt. . . something, a sensation he couldn't put a name to, even though it seemed to be on the very tip of his tongue.
When the fog suddenly abated, in perfect time with the feelings shooting through his body, he'd immediately noticed the differences in the surrounding area, visual or not. Most surprising of all was the change in the feeling ringing through his mind. Gone was the pervasive feeling of evil drenching the place he'd been. While he still felt something that hinted of ill will and dread, it was not so much that he felt dirty.
It had taken him a few minutes to get used to that feeling. Once he had, a few glances around startled him as he took in just how many more grave markers dotted the surrounding landscape. He'd shaken his head and lamented that wherever he'd been deposited this time was an even bloodier country than the last one.
He looked at the sky again, with its unfamiliar starscape. The moon had begun its descent, which hinted that morning was only a few hours away. Apparently, he'd been knocked senseless for more than a few minutes. He glanced at these strange vampires, young ones by the look of them, and decided to approach them. <After all,> he grimly noted, <misery loves company.>
He walked forward, surreptitiously throwing his cloak off his left shoulder while reaching behind his back with his left hand. As the undead sensed his approach, he nodded a greeting. "Good evening."
One of the vampires guardedly growled, "What do you want, asshole?"
That term was totally lost on him. He shrugged easily and let a disarming smile form on his lips. "I just find it strange that you would be trying to break into a crypt like this. In my experience, newborn vampires like yourselves try to get out of such burial plots."
Another of the vampires snarled, "The Glove is ours, you idiot! Now walk away and we won't have to kill you!"
"You would kill me over a piece of clothing?" the man asked. That was amusing. <Pauper vampires. A novel concept.>
"The Glove of Myneghon is powerful," the first vampire said with a covetous gleam in his eyes. "Big time magic. We're gonna use it to take down the Slayer and start running this town."
Now this was beginning to make sense. <Looting a crypt for a magical device, to kill someone and conquer this town.> The man felt a blaze of anger erupt in his soul at the idea of these bastards disturbing the dead for personal gain.
"Grave robbers," he snapped, his voice cold. The trio must have sensed the change in his body language, because they began tensing up.
"The glove is ours!" the second vampire roared.
"Of course," he drawled tiredly. He whipped his left hand out. As always, he suppressed a twinge of disgust at the item in said hand, but he'd learned long ago that necessity could make one do almost anything.
The soft "twang" of a bowstring being released sounded through the night. While not very powerful, the compact crossbow was easily carried. It also helped that the wooden dart was coated with garlic oil.
The bolt struck home, hitting the vampire in the left side of his chest. As the creature began screaming, the man spun around, the sound of steel sliding free of a scabbard like music to his ears. The backhanded swing sent the blade of the man's sword penetrating into the vampire's neck.
The vampire's demise almost cost him his advantage of surprise. He was stunned by the sudden physical changes in the thing's face just before his sword struck, and by the sudden disintegration of the vampire into dust as his head flew free of the rest of his body.
The main saving grace was the paralysis that overcame the deceased vampire's cohorts, perhaps at the shock of the ease with which he'd eliminated the first one, especially with his shorter than average stature.
Now that he had the advantage, he worked to further it. Dropping the now empty crossbow, the grim fighter drew a dagger from his belt. He brought his blades to bear and moved forward to strike. The first remaining vampire fell easily, his spinning blades making its eyes cross until he could dispatch it. As the undead boy turned into ashes, which the swordsman found much cleaner than other methods of disposing of undead, he turned on his sole remaining opponent.
The young vampire braved the fighter's keen edged weapons, taking a dagger hit in the arm. It crashed into him, using his larger bulk to knock him to the ground. The impact sent bursts of pain through his bones, his head cracking against the earth.
The vampire tried to deliver an axe handle to his face, only to have the fists caught by one hand. He reached up with the other and gripped the vampire's face, his first two fingers using its eye sockets as handholds.
The vampire yelped in pain as the man began to squeeze, showing the fanged human what very few beings knew; that he was stronger than most vampires.
Keeping his grip on the vampire's head, the warrior worked his way back to a standing position, ignoring the hands feebly clawing at his own. He grabbed the vampire by the neck and gave both hands a sharp jerk. His efforts were rewarded by the sound of cracking vertebrae.
The vampire's limbs went limp like those of a stringless marionette. He pulled his hands loose, wiped the gore off on the collapsed body, and then released his victim, who dropped to the ground in a heap.
The warrior picked up the body and carried it over to a small clump of trees. Leaving the corpse where it would be unlikely to be found, but still receive a good dose of light come dawn, the man walked back to the crypt the trio had been attempting to break into.
He carefully studied the entrance for several moments, examining the cracks that formed the mausoleum's doorway. Finding what he needed, the warrior reached between the cracks and pulled, allowing the familiar scent of the dead to pierce his senses. Pushing the smells out of his mind through long, personal experience, he entered the crypt and pulled the door shut behind him.
As he was enshrouded in darkness, the victorious fighter walked to the middle of the cold stone floor and gratefully sat down. He wouldn't be disturbed here, so he could spend some time alone. Not having anything better to do, he reached into the bag at his belt and reached inside. His fingers closed around what was essentially his only friend in the world. Bringing the item up to his lips, he began to blow.
His ears warmly greeted the sounds of music coming from the flute.
St. Wolf Residence
Sunnydale, California
Late Hours
12 July 2000
"Wow. This isn't exactly what I expected," Colene muttered, looking at the two-floor house that these guys claimed was their headquarters.
"What were you expecting?" Nona asked, a touch of humor in her voice.
"Maybe something more, I don't know. . . Armyish?" The novice telepath glanced over at the redhead named Willow. "So just what does your boss do that he can afford a place like this?"
As she approached the door, the confessed witch smiled at her. "He makes a hundred grand a year selling antiques." By the light in her green eyes, Colene just knew the punchline was going to be a doozy. "That is, when he's not working as a demon hunter or CIA-type spook."
<I just had to ask,> Colene groaned. As Willow opened the door, Nona gripped her arm.
"Colene, there is powerful magic over this house," she said, not resorting to telepathy. "The house has powerful wards over it."
Colene saw why she hadn't thought rather than speak. She was staring right at the other sorceress. // You want answers. //
Nona nodded. Willow smiled like she didn't mind talking about the magic Nona was sensing after that Shaw girl translated for Nona.
"It's okay. They're purely defensive," she explained. She turned to go in and opened the door. That Oz guy walked in and Colene could hear pride in Willow's voice. "It's your basic combination of white wizardry, Wicca, technopagan, and Hecate Greek magic, layered one on top of the other and woven together."
//Maybe that's why she's so proud of it, // Colene sent to Nona. "She's probably one of the people who helped put the wards up. // Another question came to mind. // Just how powerful is this girl, Nona? //
<Not as powerful as me, but her control is impeccable. Willow knows what she is doing. But I still think we can trust them.>
Colene paused at the doorway and glanced at Darius, who nodded to her to second the motion. So she took the lead and stepped into the house. Once again, her expectations about a magical commando unit were disappointed when she saw the cool looking living room.
"Okay, so demon hunting pays well?" she asked. She looked at the tiny smiles on Willow and Oz's face while her hearing picked up the others entering behind her.
"It has its benefits," the older girl replied with a chuckle. Colene followed her gaze as she said, "Colene, why don't you, Nona, and Darius take a load off and relax while Oz and I put our stuff away? Shaw, you want to grab them some drinks?"
Without waiting for Shaw's nod, Willow and Oz left the room with Shaw and. . . <What was it? Sara?>
"Would you like anything to drink?" the black-haired elf asked her, interrupting her thought train.
"Uh, sure. You got any pops?"
"More than enough," Shaw answered with a grin. "Nona? Darius?"
//Nona, go with her and keep an eye on her, just in case. We don't want her slipping us a Mickey. // Nona's reply was a mass of confusion, so Colene elaborated. // We don't want her drugging us to sleep! I'm willing to trust these guys, but only so far. //
Nona's emotions flared in agreement and Colene could feel her uncertainty. When it came to the world around her, her friend could really be naïve at times. As Nona stood up to go with Shaw, Colene heard footsteps coming down the stairs. She turned around and saw more elves, but these two looked older, and they had "normal" Earth clothing on!
What struck Colene was how different they were. The guy could be barely taller than her, maybe four inches! He had glittering silver hair tied in a ponytail and his eyes were amber, like a dog or cat's. But the lady, whoa!
She had to be six feet if she was an inch! And she was gorgeous! She even put Nona to shame, and that was saying something! She had red hair the color of brand new copper wire, long legs, and those same amber eyes. Not to mention an Ivory Snow complexion to die for.
<I feel an inferiority attack coming on.> She then glanced at Darius and grinned. // Down, boy! //
<Very funny, Colene,> he said, but she could feel he got the joke.
"Mother!" shouted Sara, who ran over and excitedly hugged the hot lady elf.
<That explains why they're here,> Colene thought; these were Sara's parents.
The guy elf smiled at his kid and Colene could see the love they had for each other. "So how was your time with Shawukay, Willow, and Oz?"
With shining eyes and kiddie enthusiasm, she proudly declared, "I killed an Earth vampire, Father!"
Colene saw the kid was definitely a hero-wannabe. But her parents didn't seem to share her enthusiasm. They both turned their eyes and very slowly looked past her. Colene looked behind her and saw Shaw standing there, a look of exasperation in her eyes.
"She killed a vampire?" the not-so-proud Daddy asked.
"Aeurulieth," the elf girl who spoke Nona's lingo sighed, "these people arrived through a dimensional doorway and were attacked by vampires. We moved to help them and Soraka guarded them."
Colene saw what was going on here, or so she thought. She beamed to her friends, // I think Mommy and Daddy Elf let their kid go out, expecting them not to find any vampires. I think she wanted to see how these guys do things and, well, you know how stubborn kids can be. //
<Yes, we might,> Darius laughed at her.
//Don't go there, // Colene shot back, settling down to enjoy the show.
Shaw tried her best but, simply put, she could not hide the pride she felt over how well Soraka had handled herself in her first real combat.
She could sense that the visitors were looking for any information they could get on the Slayerettes, and she could understand their caution. <After all, I went through this two years ago.> But although she couldn't blame them, she had an easy way around their curiosity.
{We could hardly have avoided the vampires, Aeurulieth. I felt a natural disturbance and we moved to investigate. As it was, Soraka did have the instincts to stand behind a powerful warrior-witch and a werewolf. She showed good sense, calm nerves, and she performed flawlessly.}
Her brother looked down at the beaming child and then at Llednas. Shaw knew they were communicating through their rapport, discussing either what had happened, or how they were going to get even with her for getting Soraka into a vampire battle.
<So much for the easier patrol routes. . .> She shook her head. <Sometimes it just does not pay to save the world.>
"Well, I hope that this will satisfy your curiosity for the rest of our visit, Soraka," Llednas said, using the Common tongue, which universal laws translated into English. "You can see what your aunt's life is like and how she helps to protect her world and people. Now, have fun with the other young ones for the rest of your visit."
Shaw saw some disappointment in Soraka's eyes, but she did smile. "Very well, Mother."
//She lied to us! // Colene's indignant voice shouted inside Nona's mind.
Darius calmly asked, <How did she lie, Colene?>
Nona knew and told him. < Shaw or Shawukay, whatever her true name is, told us that Soraka and her parents were visiting from their homeworld. >
//And she told us she was from Scotland! But Soraka is her niece! //
Nona got flashes of imagery that helped answer her unspoken questions; this ‘Scotland' place was an Earth kingdom, yet the two fairy warriors were related. So if her niece was from another world. . .
<Perhaps she lied to us to protect her niece, Colene,> Darius said again. <As we do not know how far we can trust these warriors, we are also strangers to them. Lying to protect her family, I think is excusable.>
Colene couldn't argue with that, and Nona understood Shaw's position better than most. She was still dealing with the grief of losing her parents when she'd invoked the anima.
//If you had wanted information about these people, you could have asked me, // came Seqiro's voice.
Nona blinked as Colene's mental voice snapped, // Why didn't you say so sooner, Horseface! And don't say it was because we didn't ask! //
A mental horse sigh sounded in Nona's head. // Sharillon has been very forthcoming with basic information regarding those who rescued us. They can be trusted. //
<Are you sure?> Nona asked hopefully. A burst of positive feelings radiated in her mind.
//Can you tell us anything? // Colene asked, keeping her mind on the business of protecting them.
//They will tell you more, given time, according to Sharillon. However, she does seem more concerned with. . . flirting. //
Nona brought a hand up to cover her smile over the image of that other horse flirting with Seqiro. She felt that Colene was also laughing on the inside. <Colene,> she said, <perhaps we can relax our guard just a bit and accept their hospitality for now. >
//Maybe, // Colene said carefully. // Let's play it by ear and see where this goes. //
"Excuse me," the appointed leader of the band said, "but who are your friends?"
Nona noticed that she didn't let on that they'd slipped about revealing their filial relationship. The black-haired fairy woman nodded easily enough. "All right." She waved to each in turn. "Soraka, you have already met, up close and personally. The others are Aeurulieth Redstar, my brother, and his wife, Llednas Amarillis. While on Earth, they respectively use the names Sara, Eric, and Linda, for their cover identities." She then gave the other half of the introductions. "These are Darius, Colene, and Nona. They became stranded here while traveling through this plane. We are going to try and help them find a way back onto their path."
"Well met," Llednas said warmly. "I am sure Shawukay and her friends will be more than able to help you."
//Here's hoping, // Colene's voice muttered.
Nona wished she could bolster Colene's spirits, but her friend's depressive state was beyond her own healing talents. "Shaw," she asked, "might we get something to drink as we were offered?"
Shaw nodded and said, "The kitchen is this way." Nona wondered why she sounded so relieved.
//Maybe because she's getting away from a Mom and Dad whose little kid got stuck in a bunch of vampires? // Colene innocently inquired.
Nona followed the woman into the kitchen and saw three younger girls, about Colene's age, sitting with a young boy. Two of the girls were twinborn, with the other having long, brown hair. The boy had red hair and gazed at her with wary eyes. She felt a stab of pity that someone so young should have such a cynical outlook. It reminded her too much of Colene.
The brown-haired girl asked something in Colene's language, and again she felt glad that this elf woman spoke her native tongue. Shaw replied, giving a semi-lengthy explanation, the only words known to Nona being the names of herself and her friends. She even included Seqiro and Burgess. She then turned to her and smiled.
"Nona," she said in Nona's tongue, "these are Dawn Summers, sister to one of our leaders, Brian Jessup, her boyfriend, and two of my cousins, Anna and Elizabeth Madison. While not active members of our team, they still manage to get into enough trouble on their own."
The four children shouted something in what she assumed was youthful protest and smiled at their antics. Shaw just grinned and winked at her, confirming her suspicions.
//Her cousins? // Colene's surprised voice asked, reflecting Nona's sudden confusion. // MORE elves? //
<No! They are human like us!> That brought up more flares of suspicion from Colene. <I'm sure an explanation will come, Colene. Let us do as Seqiro asks and give them time. Her family tree isn't important right now,> she decided. <We have other things to think about, like getting back on the Virtual Mode and resting.>
Colene silently grumbled something about trusting people who didn't tell them the truth, but conceded the argument. Nona brought her attention back to the kitchen, where Shaw was probably explaining the situation to the children. To her surprise, they seemed to understand the explanation quite well.
The four children got up and headed out, but not before giving Nona what she assumed were greetings by their waves and cordial tones. She smiled and looked at the warrior next to her.
"They seem nice," she kindly offered with a smile.
"They are." Shaw opened the device she recognized as a "fridge" in Colene's terminology and reached in. She pulled out several liquid-filled bottles and set them on the table. "I assume your friend Colene can drink soft drinks. For you and Darius, I will play it safe and give you fruit juices, if that is all right?"
<Colene?> Her friend answered in the affirmative, mollified a bit by the girl's seeming concern. "That's acceptable, thank you."
The woman just nodded and pulled out another bottle, presumably for herself. Nona decided to see if she could get more information about this particular world from the fairy.
"Can I ask you something?"
Shaw looked at her, her hazel eyes neutral. "You want to know how I can have an elven niece and human cousins?" She must have read the surprise in her body, because she smiled a bit. "For someone traveling between worlds, the answer is easier than it is for most. Short version, Aeurulieth is my brother through our mother's first husband. My father was human, and his grandmother, my great-grandmother, was from this Earth. An American, in fact."
"So you are half human," Nona realized. <She's right, it is simple!>
//For us, because we walk the Virtual Mode, // Seqiro's mature voice sounded. // And Nona may be right about Shaw's prior dissembling. Darius and I both sensed her feelings for Soraka. //
"So that is how you have relatives from two different worlds?" Nona asked. She could understand keeping secrets about one's family.
Shaw's eyes gleamed with relief. "It is usually confusing to those who hear it the first time," she agreed. She picked up the bottles and said, "Let us rejoin your friends. Willow and Oz can get their own drinks; I for one want to get out of this battle armor."
Nona laughed and joined her in departing the kitchen.
Willow had to compliment Shaw's idea; sending the kids out to meet Colene was a good plan. A few minutes later, Shaw and Nona stepped out and handed drinks to Colene and Darius. Once again, Willow wondered just how jealous Cordy was going to be when she saw Nona's body. <Of course, Faith will just compliment her on her rack.> Willow felt a elicit thrill about that meeting; a sorceress from another world and the Boston Bad Girl.
She'd given Colene the smallest of details on the Slayerettes and the Hellmouth, for their own safety, as well as covering a little on Section Seven. She left out the stuff like her being an Amazon and the details about Oz and his full moon thingie.
Darius walked up to her and said, "Since we neglected to do so earlier during the mayhem of your rescue, thank you for helping us."
His English was new to him, like he'd been taught, but she could understand him pretty well. "It's our job, Darius. Fighting the magical bad guys and making it safe for normal people to live their lives. We've even saved our world on a few occasions." <Not to mention a few other worlds.>
The man seemed to think about that. "And you think that you can help us return to the Virtual Mode?"
"I'll be honest with you, Darius," the red witch admitted, "the two guys on our team who know the most about magic are out of town right now. But we know our stuff and we have a lot of contacts, so I think at least one of them will know something about your situation."
Since Darius was an empathy, Willow knew he could read her confidence. He seemed reassured and Willow offered him a seat between Colene and Dawn, who were talking about Amazon stuff.
Willow groaned on the inside. <Thanks, Dawnie. I wanted to keep that a secret. . .>
"Okay, so you're not an Amazon yet," Colene said, making sure she had her facts straight, "but you're going to be one once you turn fourteen."
"Yep," the girl said eagerly. Colene liked these kids; they weren't like the ones back home. "So what's your deal, besides this whole dimensional road trip thing?"
Colene couldn't help but feel a little self-conscious. She shrugged and answered, "Me? I just have some minor telepathy and this kind of dream precognition thing. But they're both pretty new; I've only had them a few weeks. Heck, I can barely read minds twenty feet away."
"Hey, Kait's the same way," Brian said. If she weren't married, Colene mused, she might find him cute. "She's still working on her stuff; telekinesis, mind blasts, and that adrenaline rush thing. Lets her be strong and fast as an Amazon for a few minutes, but it leaves her wiped out if she pushes herself too long."
"Yeah," the twin she thought was Lizzie added, "she's still not strong as she'd like to be, but she's working at it. Just give yourself time and keep practicing."
When put that way by people her own age, it made Colene feel a little better. "Thanks."
Dawn grinned. "No prob. Trust me, we know what it's like to be surrounded by older, more powerful dudes and dudettes. Amazons, witches, empowered guys, yadda, yadda. But our time will come. When it does, we hope we'll be ready. In fact, me and Bri had our first big action last Thanksgiving."
Colene perked up at that. Just because she'd seen a lot while traveling the Virtual Mode and visiting other realities, she still liked hearing about other peoples' adventures. <And these guys have had some, all right.> "What happened?"
"Well, it's like this," Dawn started, "one of our friends from San Fran can see the future, sort of like you. She saw some of us in a vision that said we had to go along with the guys or things would get way nasty."
"This was before we moved here," Anna said sourly. Obviously the twins had missed out on a lot.
"So where did you go?" Colene asked. "Was it another reality?"
"Yep," Brian chuckled. "Let's just say that Hobbit feet are even hairier than you ever imagined."
Colene's jaw dropped at the way he said that. She looked over at that Oz guy, who just cocked an eyebrow. From what she'd seen, that was a yes. "You guys went to Middle Earth?" she said weakly. <I'll just let the fact that I can accept Middle Earth as being just another reality alone for now. . .> "Whoa. What happened?"
"There was a part of the mission that only kids could handle," Dawn said with way gleaming eyes. "Me, Bri, Kait, Kat, and Debbie got to use these kick ass magic wands that shot fireballs, lightning bolts, and stuff."
"Dawn!" an older voice snapped, startling Colene and the girls she was talking to.
"What?" she whined, turning around.
The girl who'd snapped at her was short, blonde, and carried herself like the guys who'd saved them from the vampires. Her blue-green eyes flashed as she said, "You better be glad Mom isn't here to hear you say, ‘ass!'"
Oh, this had to be Buffy, the girl half in charge of Willow's unit.
"Oh come on, Buffy. Mom knows I'm growing up. Anyway," Dawnie said, putting a hand on her shoulder, "this is Colene. She's one of the guys Willow told you about, the ones who got stuck here."
Buffy broke into a friendly smile. "Pleased to meet you. I'm Buffy. Steve's on the phone right now, but once we're settled down, we'll get on your problem. We'll do our best to get you on your way again."
Colene liked the confidence she showed. // Explains part of why a former cheerleading bottle blonde, as Dawn calls her, is running a magical commando unit. If they save the world once in a while, then getting us on the Virtual Mode should be doable. // She felt hopeful agreements from the rest of the group. "Thanks. If there's anything we can do to help. . ."
Buffy glanced at Dawn, sitting next to her. She nodded. "Okay. At least on researching your problem. You know more about this Virtual Mode thing than we do, so anything you can tell us without giving away secrets you have to keep, will be a big help to us. And we'll start making arrangements for you guys to stay somewhere."
"We'll give you everything we can," Colene promised. She liked the fact that the people didn't expect her, Nona, and Darius to spill everything, but were willing to put them up.
Buffy smiled again and walked away. Dawn leaned in and whispered, "Don't worry. She's not as blonde upstairs as she looks."
Colene rolled her eyes, prompting the other kids to laugh.
Main Street
Sunnydale, California
Early hours
13 July 2000
"Where in the Gods' names am I?"
He clung to the shadows and stared out at the strange scene before him. People in strange garb walking down the streets, chatting in a strange tongue that he was surprised to find he understood. Larger buildings than he'd seen in a long time advertised various things, and those carriages! He fervently thanked whatever Powers were listening that he hadn't blindly stepped into the path of one of those metal monstrosities.
It might not kill him, but it would probably hurt like the Nine Hells. He decided that if he were going to fit in here, he'd have to find proper attire. So he faded into the shadows, choosing to observe several of these strange humans in order to see what they would consider suitable attire.
An hour later, he sat down in the crypt, looking through the things he'd had to steal from a local merchant in order to blend in. He hoped that when the sun fell again, he'd be able to pass as one of the natives long enough to figure out where he was. He was surprised to see so many churches in a city this size, but then people needed all the protection against things that prowled the night that they could get.
He laid out some of the clothes and decided to search the crypt for that item the vampires had been searching for when he'd arrived hours earlier. It took him a good hour before he finally found what he was looking for.
<Not that I would be stupid enough to put it on,> he chuckled. <I will first find out why those vampires wanted it so badly.>
Setting the powerful item into his pack, the vampire hunter settled down to get some rest. Just as he began to settle back, a massive feeling of unease shot through him. It felt just like. . .
<Oh no. Just like when I ended up in this graveyard!>
Standing up and reaching for his sword, the hunter prepared to leave the safety of this temporary camp when the feeling suddenly abated, then vanished, leaving him cold with the memory of what he'd just felt. He sincerely hoped it wasn't the ill omen he feared it was. He decided to see if anything was out there and left the safety of the crypt, taking this mysterious magical relic with him.
St. Wolf Residence
Sunnydale,
California
Early hours
13 July 2000
"Are you all right?"
Shaw dimly heard Buffy's voice through the fuzziness in her head. Two new "nature quakes," as Willow had decided to call them, had hit in the last hour, leaving her feeling less than perfect. She let out a soft sigh and muttered, "That depends. Is Sunnydale sinking into the ocean?"
"No," Buffy said with a roll of her eyes.
"Then I am all right, or will be." <Although that might take time.>
"Here." That was Willow. Shaw looked up and saw a large glass of water in one hand and some aspirin in the other. "This'll help."
She nodded tiredly and gratefully accepted the medicine.
"She said she sensed something like this when we showed up," Colene's voice sounded. "Does that mean the Virtual Mode might be back open?"
"Probably not." The ranger looked up to see Steven standing there, a concerned look on his face. "According to Horace, Shaw's just one of many mystics feeling such disturbances in the forces of nature, across the world. It's a series of rips in the barriers separating Earth from the Ethereal Plane, although they're still trying to determine the root cause. So what Shaw actually felt was a false alarm caused by rips in the dimensional barriers."
"And with the Virtual Mode being a pathway through realities like this one, it's causing the Mode to be disrupted?"
"It's possible," Giles said, taking off his glasses and smiling in approval. "I think it's safe to say that these rips might be random, but spread through more than our reality. Thus your Virtual Mode might have, for lack of a better term, shut down to prevent any further damage that might have been caused."
"Okay, now that much I can understand happening," Colene said, and Shaw noted the concurring nods from her friends. Shaw had been right; she knew a telepath's aura when she read one.
"However, this is all supposition at this point," Giles continued. "If that is the case, than perhaps what is causing the rips merely caused the disruption of the Mode as a side effect. It will take some more research on our part to narrow down the possibilities."
"Great. Research party," Dawn muttered. Shaw watched her tap Colene's shoulders. "What that means is, the old guys get to go kick evil butt while we're stuck reading dusty old books."
"In the meantime," Steve said carefully, "some of us need to make the rounds and make sure nothing nastier than our usual friends is coming through those rips. We'll patrol in three teams. Me, Buffy, and Randi will start downtown and work north. Giles, Jenny, Willow, and Oz will check the cemeteries. Amy, call Faith and Kendra, start at the Bronze and hit the other teen spots and campuses. The rest of you, sit tight and start hitting the books and prepping weapons."
Shaw started to stand up but wobbled a bit. Dawn and Willow had to catch her.
"That's why you're staying here. If any more holes open up, I don't want you caught out in the open. If any more openings occur, I want you to tell Dawn or Brian and have them call us."
Shaw glared at Steven. "So I am your burglar alarm now?" she wryly asked.
She didn't wait for him to say anything, she sat back down and glanced at Amy, who grinned at her. <Laugh it up, Amy.>
"Dawn, you and Brian keep an eye on things here," Steven ordered. "Break out some small arms for yourselves, just in case. I don't want anything happening because we didn't anticipate it."
Buffy pulled out her sword and looked everyone over. "That's right. We need to be ready for anything. There's no telling what might come through those rifts."
Main Street
Sunnydale, California
Early hours
13 July 2000
The tall, handsome man looked up and down the avenue, taking in the sights and sounds of this town. Things had certainly changed since he'd last walked someplace like this. And that warm feeling he got just told him that he was going to enjoy this little vacation from the last place he'd "visited."
He decided to get a feel for the situation in this town before making any overt moves. He figured he had more than enough to enjoy himself, but unlike the place he'd come from, the natives of this world would probably notice bodies showing up in large quantities. So he'd have to adjust his tactics accordingly to suit the world he now found himself on.
He smiled and took a deep sniff, as if one could appreciate the "scent" of a Hellmouth. Well, he could.
Yes, being on the Hellmouth would probably be much more fun than Barovia or Sithicus.
Time for some fun, he decided.
St. Wolf Residence
Sunnydale, California
Early hours
13 July 2000
Colene watched the door for a moment as the people left behind started moving, and couldn't help but be impressed with the way these guys worked. // I still can't believe they're leaving Dawn and Brian in charge? //
<Based on what they have shared with us so far, Dawn and Brian have been training to protect themselves for two years or more, Colene. Perhaps they are skilled enough to be trusted to defend this house from intruders. //
<And the girl Soraka was able to protect you from a vampire with magic and a sword, Colene.> That came from Nona. <Perhaps the other younger ones have similar skills.>
//Rub it in, // she grumbled with a touch of good nature. She took a swig of Pepsi and looked at Shaw, who still looked a little wobbly. "You going to be okay?"
In response, the woman who'd helped them out glanced at her brother. "I am still wondering," she said ironically. Colene couldn't help but agree; the woman had gotten her niece into a fight with vampires. "I am so proud of her, though. She handled herself so well it was amazing."
Dawn and Brian coming back into the living room cut anything else out. Colene shivered at the sight of the two teenagers from this reality carrying pistols at their hips. She had to ask. "Do you guys know how to use those?"
Dawn looked offended, but Brian seriously answered, "As good as normal kids can be after two years of training with a Green Beret."
"Oooookay." <Ask a silly question. . .>
Brian just smiled at her and looked to the older elves. "Eric, Linda, do you want to turn in or stay up?"
"Linda" stood up and laughed. "Aeurulieth and I took leave from the Guard to get away from soldering for a while. You would think we learned our lesson after our last visit to this world."
"Do not remind me," Shaw groaned.
Curious about that little exchange, Colene looked at Lizzie, who mouthed, "Tell you later." She grinned back before asking Dawn, "So now what?"
"You Mode guys sit back, relax, and shoot the breeze," Dawn said, getting serious. "Me, Bri, Anna, and Lizzie will take turns watching the phones and computer while our pointy-eared Richter scale waits for more false alarms."
She and Nona giggled at the evil stare Shaw sent at the laughing kids.
//I think we might actually enjoy this stay, // Colene beamed to the others. // What do you think? //
<It will be nice to rest a bit, but we do want to get back on the Virtual Mode as soon as is feasible.> Colene did agree with Nona on that much. < But I will like the chance to discuss the types of magic practiced by Willow and her friends. Unlike them, I have no formal training in my powers. Any chance to hone my control will only benefit us in the long run.>
//And there's the fact that to them, you're just ‘another girl' with magic powers, not the big Ninth of the Ninth? //
She could ‘feel' Nona's mental smile. <That too.>
Colene agreed and decided to ask just where the members of the hive were going to stay while in this reality. She walked over to where Dawn was peeking out the window and keeping an eye on the front yard. "Can I ask you something?"
Dawn's brown hair whirled around as she turned to smile at her. "Shoot."
"Where are we going to stay while we're here? Usually we just camp out in the wilds or something."
"Oh, is that all?" She considered the question for a few seconds. "I don't think staying at the Motor Lodge would be a good idea for you guys. You and Darius might be hitched, but we still have the term ‘jail bait' here." Colene rolled her eyes in agreement. "Maybe you and your hubby can stay at my place. Mom wouldn't mind or make waves. Believe me, compared to some of our guys, your relationship's totally normal." She shrugged. "Buffy stays here half the time anyway, so you guys could probably use her room."
Colene sent a silent question out to Darius, who promptly answered, <Your ‘hubby' has no objections.> She nodded to Dawn. "How about Nona?"
"She could stay with me, Dawn," Shaw offered, standing up and looking a little better. "With Robin and Liam out of town, that only leaves Giles, Zev, and myself as people who speak Gaelic, and Liam's house has enough room. This way, she would not need an interpreter or have any problems communicating. I am sure he would not mind, especially if she is her world's version of Irish."
<Irish? Whatever.> Colene did ask, "Who's Liam?"
"Nature Girl's leprechaun sex toy," the other brunette teen answered evilly.
The others laughed, except for said Nature Girl. Colene sighed. <Leprechauns. Sure, why not. We've already met Amazons, vampires, a werewolf, and elves, so why not a leprechaun?> She looked to Nona, who nodded in approval. She had no objections and it did give her someone to talk to.
"That's cool," she told Dawn and Shaw. "Now that that's settled, how hard do you think it'll be to solve our pit stop problem?"
"I dunno, Colene," the girl answered honestly. "I mean, I'm not a book geek when it comes to cross-dimensional stuff. Hell, doing a time travel thing last year was bad enough! But if anyone can do it, it's our team. Heck, they're probably looking for answers right now."
Green Lawn Cemetery
Sunnydale, California
Early hours
13 July 2000
"This is where we hooked up, alright."
Willow nudged a pile of dust with the toe of her boot. This told her that this was the place they'd met the Mode travelers. She glanced at Oz, whose wolfy senses told him the same thing. He nodded calmly without even looking at her.
"I can sense. . . something," Jenny muttered. "Close and it is extra dimensional, but it's closed off on both sides. It's almost as if it's been blocked off intentionally."
"But at least it's still active. Perhaps it is a safety measure, something automatic." Giles was peering off into the distance, but Willow thought he probably was focusing on something else. After all, he was stronger in magic than her. "I'm detecting some Ethereal energies nearby. Now that we know what to look for, I'm getting a strong reading about. . . a quarter mile from here. We'd better be prepared; we don't know what might come through."
On cue, Jenny pulled out a sword and pistol loaded with Demon Killer rounds, while Giles pulled out a Glock and wand of some sort. It looked like one of the ones Alassra had given them last year. Oz shifted into wolf form while Willow pulled out her sword and hid it under her duster to keep its light from giving them away.
"Jenny, come left with me. Oz, Willow, go right, go out no more than two hundred yards. Try not to let anything slip by you."
The Wicca Princess of the Amazon Nation followed her lover and made her way through the graveyard. Oz carefully picked his way through the suddenly foggy area, but she trusted his instincts. Still, she felt a slight shiver running up and down her spine. They made their way in but Willow stopped when the chill in her bones increased proportionately to the growing mists surrounding her.
The fog grew thicker and cut Oz off from her field of vision. That sinking feeling grew darker and she decided to play it safe. "Oz! Back off!"
Willow, came a throaty voice, I would suggest teleporting or gating out of this fog.
"I can't abandon Oz!" the hacker protested angrily.
Teleport or gate to the entrance of the cemetery, so you are not strained beyond calling for help! At least you will still be close! The voice countered. Willow, this fog. . . it seems unnatural. You will do them no good if something happens to you. Please.
That struck a chord with Willow, although she knew there were other reasons behind the plea. She was about to consider the advice when the fog suddenly lessened a bit, allowing her to see Oz again. He'd changed back and upon seeing her, walked over and, slightly less than emotionlessly, muttered, "This is creepy."
For once, we agree on something.
"Etriel!"
She sent an embarrassed look Oz's way, but he just smiled a tad. "She's got a point."
"Yeah, but. . ." Willow looked around and saw the fog was lifting, and with it her chills receded. "Oz?"
"Hmmm." He sniffed a bit and cocked his head. "Huh." Willow gave him the resolve face and he started moving, leaving her to follow. "I smell people and. . . huh. Cut wood. Other stuff, too."
Willow sighed. For Oz, that was the same thing as one of Steve's six hour debriefs. "Let's find Jenny and Giles."
"Hey."
Jenny and Giles both jumped and Oz heard their hearts beating faster. He also heard a low, Cockney curse.
"Sorry."
Giles settled his glasses back into place and gave him an impatient look. "If you're quite through giving us coronaries, take a look."
Oz moved into the space vacated by the teacher guys and took a peek. He felt and smelled Willow settling down next to him. He heard her gasp in surprise and let his other senses take hold so he could get as much info as he could.
He saw the wood wagons that were finishing up forming a circle, he'd guess about a hundred yards across. He saw some people working here and there, setting up booths and small tents, and it brought to mind people setting up a circus or something. He didn't see any elephants or anything, but he did hear and smell animal scents, including horses and something he couldn't identify.
"Huh. Cool."
The rocker leaned into Willow and muttered, "You know anything about a circus coming to town?"
"Uhhh, no." She sounded confused and not for the first time, he wondered just what that must feel like. "Jenny, Giles, do you think we should call in backup or check them out first?"
"Well, they don't seem to be hostile as of yet. . ." Giles started but Oz waved him down.
"Someone coming." He sniffed the air again and looked around. His ears picked up the sound of something beating against the air. His wolfish instincts fed him the image of birds taking flight and the guitarist looked up and saw something dark against the night sky. "Get down."
As they did, Oz executed a partial shift, just enough to heighten his senses even more. In their enhanced state, his eyes picked up someone circling above the forming campsite. He felt a little thanks that the wind was favorable and sniffed. <Interesting.> He cocked his eyebrow and reversed the change. "Weird. Human girl with bat wings."
"Are you sure she's human?" Willow asked. Oz glanced at her and saw that she was using magic to see what he'd seen. "She looks kinda demony to me. Like a succubus."
Oz just cocked an eyebrow.
"Okay, you're sure," she sighed. She whispered softly and Oz recognized her detect bad guys spell. She looked again and frowned in confusion. "She's not evil, either."
"Perhaps we should try to gain her attention before she makes a spectacle of herself flying over Sunnydale," G-Man suggested. "A woman flying around Sunnydale would be hard to cover up, even for us."
Made sense. Oz cocked his eyebrow at Willow again and she smiled. "I'm on it."
Willow stood up and let her hands light up with gold mojo light. Flying girl saw it and started weaving back and forth, like she thought Will would attack. His Wicca girl just waved her hands back and forth before the light on her left hand died out. She used the other hand to guide the girl in.
The girl circled a few times, like she was looking for someone hiding on her. <Smart,> he decided.
She started coming down so he stepped back. So did Giles and Jenny. The girl came up short and hovered for just a sec before touching down. She folded those bat wings and looked them over.
Oz looked her over. She was a little taller than Will, with real short black hair and dark blue eyes, and she was decked out in leather clothes that reminded him of Shaw's old outfits. She looked like a normal girl. With bat wings.
"Well," the girl, who looked all of twenty, said, "you wanted my attention badly enough. What do you want?"
"Well, uhm," his alpha girl started, "it's just that it's not really advisable for people with, well, magic-type abilities to go showing them off around here. People around here don't believe in magic."
"But you do," she noted, sounding amused.
Giles stepped forward and said, "If I might explain, Miss, I take it that you're not from, how shall I put it. . . you're from another world, yes?"
Winged Girl blinked. "We've been transported to another plane?" G-Man and Jenny nodded. "The Mists have never taken us to another plane before!"
Oz felt Willow stiffen next to him. Smelled a little Wigged.
"Did you say, ‘the Mists?'" Willow asked softly. "Where are you from?"
For the first time, the girl didn't look nice or friendly. "From a horrible town called L'Morai. But since Carnival went on the road, we've seen all sorts of realms."
Oz smelled fear on his girlfriend. <Way Wigged.> "Like uhm," she blurted, "like Kartakass or Barovia?"
The girl perked up again. "The Kartakans are friendlier than most audiences. They love our musical performers."
The grown ups started catching on and he mumbled, "Uh oh."
Willow turned to him, a look of worry in her eyes. "You call Steve, I'll call Dawnie and have Shaw get her butt out here."
Looked like some real, real bad guys might be coming to town to party. Thinking about some of the Black Hats Shaw had mentioned before, Oz knew what that could lead to.
He cocked an eyebrow. "This could be a major bummer."
Shaw dismounted from Sharillon and thought, <Go back to Seqiro and Burgess. Make sure they are safe.>
//Like that's going to be easy if what you think might be happening is happening. // her elvensteed muttered.
"I know," she spoke aloud, another shiver running up and down her spine. "But allow me my fantasies."
//You mean there's something Liam hasn't. . . //
"Do not start, Sharillon."
She knew her steed meant well, but these were possible reminders of her past that she didn't need. She sighed and patted the mare's neck. "Be careful."
//You too, Religion Girl. // said the nuzzling horse.
Shaw turned around and started walking. She supposed it was fortunate for the new "arrivals" that they'd been deposited in a rather secluded area. The last thing they needed was for the police to find other planar beings here in addition to Sunnydale's usual guests. She was still trying to assimilate that for all those years, she'd been stranded somewhere in the Ethereal Plane.
<Concentrate on your job, Hunter,> she scolded herself.
She saw the vardoes that ringed the tents and other structures that were will going up, despite whatever cautions Giles and Jenny certainly would have given the workers. She wouldn't have bothered.
She caught sight of some carnival workers and the members of the team that had beat her here. They just seemed to be watching the proceedings and looking at various performers, taking note of what they looked like. Shaw remembered her first time and was glad the others hadn't tried to stop these people from going about their business. She saw Amy break off to approach her, a worried look on her face.
"How are you feeling?" she asked softly, worry plain in her eyes.
"My second headache of the evening is almost gone," she wryly stated.
As she started to move, Amy gripped her forearm. Shaw looked at her and saw true concern in her cousin's eyes. "That's not what I meant."
Shaw glanced at the ring of wagons and considered the question. Finally, she decided, "I really do not know, Amy. I just feel that I do not need this reminder of my past."
"Says the Soul Sis who remembers her past lives," Faith drawled, coming up and giving her a hug. "How's is hanging, Shaw?"
"What is happening?" she asked, not intentionally dodging Faith's question.
"Aw, these guys are determined to put on a show no matter what, Hellmouth, you name it." The Slayer shrugged as if it wasn't a big deal to her. "G-Man's trying to explain about permits and stuff but it's pretty much over their heads. Heck, over mine too. So he called Steve and Boss Man's putting in calls to Horace to get magical fake circus permits for them to keep the cops from causin' trouble for them when they find these guys."
"I see. . ." She looked around again. "I cannot believe that Carnival is here."
"How'd you. . ." Faith hissed before looking at her with sorrow. "You know these guys."
Shaw looked into Faith's eyes. "I caught a couple days' worth of performances."
"Please don't tell me you worked at a carnival," Amy said with a grin.
"Not before coming here," she innocently said, walking away.
She moaned when Faith snickered, "And here I was so expecting a flashback sequence here."
She noticed Giles quietly discussing something with two of the troupers; a giant of a man and a man she remembered as one of the barkers. Her memories of those days watching Carnival perform were a bit hazy, so the man's name escaped her. She strode up to the trio and said, "Giles, allow me."
Her teacher glanced at her and thankfully stepped aside. "Thank you, Shaw. Perhaps you can make them see reason."
<I wish. . .> A brief yet careful glance in the mystical spectrum told her the source of the changes in the performers and set her mind at ease regarding old stories about Carnival. She also realized the source of her eerie feelings despite her enjoyment those days amongst them. So she decided to cut to the chase. She nodded greetings to the giant and barker. "Gentlemen, I know that you are busy, so I will try not to take up much of your time. My friends and I need to speak with Isolde."
The two men cautiously regarded her and the giant suspiciously rumbled, "How do you know that name?"
"I was an outlander who spent thirteen years on that plane before escaping two years ago," she flatly stated. "I enjoyed your entertainment for two days in Kartakass."
That set them a little at ease, but the larger man said, "Isolde is busy."
"Please understand, there are things about this plane that she might need to be informed of," the half-elf continued, trying to be diplomatic. "Surely you can understand that we merely want to ensure that there are no misunderstandings with the authorities and such."
"And people think I am long-winded, Hermos," the barker said with amusement.
Shaw sighed. It was going to be one of those meetings unless she came up with another tactic. She turned to Hermos, as he'd been named. "Would you at least be willing to pass on a message to Isolde?"
The giant's eyebrows furrowed, but he agreed, seeing no harm in that. "What is this ‘message?'"
Shaw gave him a friendly smile. "The message is that the Lord Rupert Giles, member of the Council of Watchers, Faith Pryce, the current Chosen One, Buffy Anne Summers, one of the Nine and daughter of the Lord Aderron, and Shawukay Hunter of Sunnydale, youngest sister of Robin Goodfellow and betrothed of Liam Danahure, welcome you and wish you and Carnival a pleasant stay on Borca del Infierno, home of Tiamat." <Let us see her ignore that message.>
The larger of the two took a few seconds, perhaps to make sure he had the message correctly and moved off. Shaw turned to the barker and said, "Some information that might be of use to you; currency on this world is somewhat different than what you are used to. My teacher and I can provide you some examples of local currency for examination and comparison."
"You seem to know a bit about our ways," he said with an upraised brow. Shaw got the impression he was humoring her. "I'm Tindal, head barker for Carnival."
Shaw nodded in greeting. "I have joined a Faire on a part-time basis since coming her to Earth. I ply my trade as a musician."
"Ahhhh. So what do you do when you're not plying your trade?" he asked slyly.
"I would be most interested in hearing that answer as well." Shaw and Giles turned and saw the "woman" named Isolde. She was almost as tall as Giles, with long black hair, piercing brown eyes, and her muscular body was encased in black fighting leathers. She had high cheekbones that might hint at elf blood in her ancestry, at least to those who did not know differently. Shaw also noted the power of the sword sitting at Isolde's hip. "Hermos, Tindal, leave us. Finish setting up."
"Lady Isolde," Shaw respectfully greeted the head of Carnival.
The woman's piercing coffee-colored eyes stared through her and Giles. She turned to Giles and demanded, "And you are?"
"Shaw Madison Hunter, Forestarm of Mielikki. This is Rupert Giles, Field Watcher. That is who we are."
"Shaw!" Giles came to her side and muttered, "Miss Isolde, I apologize for her behavior."
Isolde waved a dismissive hand. "She is young." She then focused on him. "So you are the guide for the Slayer."
He straightened up and said, "Well, yes I am. Might I ask how you know of the Slayers?"
The ravishing warrior woman in front of him arched a thin eyebrow and gave him a prim smile. "I know many things, Rupert Giles. Now perhaps you will tell me what matters so drastically demand my attention?"
Having the explanation thrust upon him, Giles started explaining the scenario as the Slayerettes knew it thus far. It only took a few minutes, after which this woman, Isolde, took a few moments to ponder the information.
She did look troubled. "I agree with you on one thing, Watcher." She looked at both of them. "This matter is most serious, indeed. But the information you gave me suggests that the breaks in the dimensional walls are somewhat unstable at best. If whatever caused this Conjunction in the first place is reversed, then the process should reverse itself. Everything that came here from the Demiplane should return there.
A gasp from Shaw turned Giles around. Her face had gone paler than usual, and he saw something in her eyes that he'd rarely seen from her.
Horror.
She turned and stormed off. Giles started to go after her, but an iron grip placed itself on his shoulder, however gently. "How long?" Isolde asked, not without compassion.
Giles sighed, understanding Shaw's fears. "She escaped only two years ago. She has never spoken much about her time there, but we know it nearly destroyed her."
"I do not sense the land's hold over her, if that means anything here," the inhumanly strong woman told him. "She could be safe, unlike us. But then, the people of Carnival are natives of the Land of Mists. So it is home to us, unlike her. But for now, allow this leader of yours to issue these credentials we supposedly need to do what we have always done; perform. Come with him tomorrow, and I will try to give you what information I can about the things that might come here. Hopefully it will better prepare you to defend the Hellmouth."
"I hope so," Giles said.
Somehow, he didn't think the next few days would be so easy.
The Bronze
Sunnydale, California
Early hours
13 July 2000
He listened to what these young humans considered music in this new age and decided that in a twisted way, it suited him. If music was an expression of human emotions, then the teenagers of this world were wilder than most.
<Yes, I definitely think I'm going to enjoy it here.>
The window in front of him reflected his appearance a bit. He double-checked it to be sure his face was acceptable by the standards of this place and deemed it such. <Well enough then.>
Searching the crowd of hormonally charged humans, he scanned their surface thoughts as easily as they would listen to each other's voices. Hearing one particularly juicy argument, he focused on an arguing couple, perhaps so he could spice it up with suggestions and drive them apart.
Hey! A male voice shouted at the female. It's not my fault we got called in on our night off!
You left your cell phone on! Came the sharp-tongued retort.
Steve would have called you on yours, Cordy! He liked this one; he didn't take any grief from his woman. So let's just get there and find out what's going on.
All right, but Steve's going to owe us, she finished.
He didn't push deeper into these two minds out of concern. There was something different about those two, especially the boy. So he decided to look for other prey, keeping what he'd learned at the forefront of his mind. He had to be subtle about how he found new ladies to seduce.
Continuing to scan the crowds, he sensed a few demonic beings in the place. Peering with senses beyond the ken of mere humans, he spied no less than four vampires in the mass of music-addled humanity. A quick thought came to mind, so he smiled and strutted downstairs. Keeping his mind reading to the vampires only, he selected the one that would be the most amenable to his idea. In other words, the stupidest.
He gripped that vampire by the shoulder and saw that he'd been barely a man before being turned. He allowed some shine to come to his eyes to show he was no mere human either and began to subtly use his charming powers on the dimwitted undead creature.
"My friend," he said casually, "I have a proposition to make that might be of benefit to both of us."
A half-hour later, the vampire disengaged its fangs from the sixteen-year-old girl's neck. She slumped over in its arms and he smiled approvingly.
"See, my friend," he suavely said to the charmed creature, "one girl yields a two-course dinner."
With a sickening thud, the girl's corpse was dropped to the ground. "So now what?" his unwitting servant asked.
"Let us find a place to stay so that we can refine our arrangement," he "suggested." He needed to know more about this particular dimension's Hellmouth and figured that one of the local vampires would be a good source of information. "Come, my friend. Once we're safely in hiding, you can tell me more about this charming little hamlet."
And if he could safely have his fun for a while by covering his tracks by making it look like simple vampire attacks against his own victims, he could enjoy it here before moving on, indeed.
St. Wolf Residence
Sunnydale, California
Early hours
13 July 2000
"So that's where we're at right now," Steve told the newest arrivals. "Needless to say, we might be in some deep shit."
"Because creatures from this plane are already showing themselves in Sunnydale, or because of the arrivals we can expect or might have missed?"
"Both, Drusilla," Sonja replied for Steve. She looked concerned, which was rare for the Hyborean. "Steve, if even the little information we have about this place's Darklords is true, then we might be in trouble, at least if they catch us individually. Even in pairs, the kids might be way out of their leagues."
Steve glanced at Buffy and Gabrielle, whose eyes were icy with thought. "Gabrielle, any comments?"
"We need more information, Steve," the Queen finally said. "We need to get as much intel as we can from Shaw and this ‘Isolde' that Giles met."
"Good luck o' that," Spike growled, rolling his eyes. Like Dru and Charlie, Steve had called them in as backup. "Bloody Spockette's scared sick that she's gonna get sucked back into that dimension."
"And she's never been very open about those years, even with Amy or Faith," Jenny added. "If we push her on it, she won't react well, even now. At least we know everyone made it home tonight."
Steve grimaced because Jenny and Sonja both had points. "Luckily for us, we've got an invitation from the leader of this Carnival, as they call themselves. So tomorrow afternoon, some of us will head out there under the guise of going to enjoy some time off."
"Maybe some of the kids could go along, just to add to the cover." Steve looked at Buffy, as did the others, at her suggestion. "Of course, they'll have to be chaperoned just in case, but that'll leave most of us free for patrolling. Meaning those of us who can stand up to these guys or have the most experience."
Put in that context, it wasn't so objectionable. The Wanderer thought about it and said, "We'll also place some of the kids at the Bronze, the Cinema, and the Mall. If they come up against something they can't handle, they can call in backup."
"Sounds good to me," Gabrielle decided. Steve watched Jenny glance at Giles, who had a worried look on his face but nodded in agreement with her. Buffy did as well.
"Okay. Giles, Jenny, you'll accompany me to the Carnival in the late afternoon. I'll talk to Buffy and come up with duty rosters before nightfall." Steve stood up and said, "Let's turn in for the night. Sonja, Gabrielle, stay for a minute."
Despite shared looks, the others vacated the office. Gabrielle looked him over with hooded eyes. "What's on your mind, Steve?"
"I hate to ask this, believe me," he sighed, wondering how they were going to take his request. "But I want to split you two up for patrols and put you in command of separate patrol groups. I'll do the same with Buffy. I know you're a team, but I'd like to give you separate commands to cover more ground and get the most out of your experience. I think Purity will help you resist most magics we might encounter, Gabrielle." He looked at the thoughtful Sonja. "As for you, as many years as you have, I don't think you'll be an easy target for anything, to say the least."
He watched Gabrielle look at her consort and nod agreeably. "It's the right thing to do. The kids might be outclassed by anything that comes through those rifts. At least we know that they're safe for today."
"That's what I'm worried about." He closed his eyes for a second. "At least this might not be something we need to call in heavy backup for. Let's get some sleep and we'll meet back here at six pm."
Summers Residence
Sunnydale, California
13 July 2000
The knock at the door startled Colene into wakefulness. She bolted upright and looked around before recalling the previous night’s events. She closed her eyes and focused. // Hey, Horsie! You awake yet? //
// I have been awake for approximately one of your hours. //
// Good. Wake Nona and Burg and keep us up to date; I don’t want to miss anything. //
Her horse sent a signal of acknowledgement, so Colene got up and put on the nightshirt Dawn had loaned her. Rubbing some sleep out of her eyes, she walked over to the door and cracked it open. She saw one of Dawn’s "adopted" sisters. . . Faith, her name was. "Hiya. What time is it?"
"’Bout nine-thirty. We slept in late and figured you could use some rest too," the girl from Boston said with a grin. "Mom’s cookin’ up some breakfast. She can’t wait to meet you guys."
Colene smiled back. "Thanks, Faith. I’ll wake Darius and we’ll be down in a bit."
"No rush." The girl stared into her eyes for a second, as if searching for something. "Take your time, C. Both of you get a shower or take one together. By the time you get downstairs, the pancakes should be just right." She winked. "If Dawnie leaves us any, that is."
Colene laughed despite blushing about the comment on her and Darius showering together. So she just said, "Thanks."
"Hey, we’re five-by-five." With that, Faith backed up so Colene could close the door and give them some privacy.
She turned around and walked back to the bed, where Darius was sitting up. She sat on his lap and pecked him on the cheek. "Morning, Darius."
"Good morning." He returned her peck with a loving kiss on the lips. "So," he asked her, "do you want to shower separately or together?"
She blushed a bit and his face fell. She quickly said, "I’m sorry, Darius. As nice as it would be, we are in someone else’s home. . ."
"I understand." He put his arms around her and held her close. "Maybe the next time."
"I’d rather it be sooner than later," she murmured. <Even if that Faith girl knew what she was talking about. . .> She stood up and said, "Maybe we can try it soon. But for now, we’re on Earth, so we’re following the Earth rule."
His confusion and amusement were pretty much equal. "What rule is that?"
"Ladies first."
She jumped up and ran, not letting him "protest."
*****
Dawn smiled as their visitors entered the kitchen, walking hand-in-hand and looking better than they had the previous night. She glanced at Mom and saw her looking them over for a few seconds before a smile touched her face and she nodded in approval of the couple Darius and Colene made. She was just glad Zev was on his way to the gallery to open up, so that Mom could spend some extra time with them this morning.
<Okay, I admit it. Zev can be cool. Sometimes.>
"Good morning," Mom said, getting two plates and setting them on the table. "It’s Colene and Darius, right?"
They answered and Colene looked way nervous. <She thinks she’s about to get the third degree,> Dawn snickered. Faith had the same look in her eyes. "So how’d you guys sleep?"
Colene blinked but shrugged. "Better than usual. We don’t have ‘real’ beds most of the time." A sad smile came to her face. "Funny how quick you get used to doing things differently on the Virtual Mode."
"I understand about changing situations," Mom said supportively. "Four years ago, I was a Mom in Los Angeles. Today, I’m the Mother of four daughters, three of whom are Vampire Slayers and one is an Amazon-to-be, and I play den mother to most of their friends."
Darius seemed to think about that, but Colene giggled. "The slumber parties must be hell for you on munchies."
"Nah, we just order pizzas up the ying-yang," Faith replied before scarfing some breakfast. "We do the same thing when we have research parties."
Colene perked up at that. "Oh God, pizza. . . that’s one thing I do miss about Earth." She looked at Darius. "You’d like pizza, Darius. Maybe we’ll try some while we’re here."
"It’s a deal," Dawn said eagerly.
"So, how did you two meet?" Mom asked, and Dawn could hear the kindness in Mom’s voice. "If you don’t mind sharing it, that is. I promise, I’ve seen many relationships, so I don’t judge people. It’s obvious you’re happy together."
Colene smiled a bit but looked at her hubby. They shared that look that told the Summers girl that they were doing the telepathy thing. He turned to Mom and told some of the story of how they’d hooked up together. Darius talked about his job as some kind of king and how he went on this whole Virtual Mode quest to get Colene back. They took turns talking about their problems and how they were getting past them, actually getting married in Texas on Colene’s Earth, where girls could get married when they were fourteen! Dawn wondered if she should spring that on Bri, just to get his goat. Colene took over and brought up how that mind predator kept tracking her and how getting stranded her had at least one silver lining.
While they were off their Mode, Colene was safe from the mind predator.
"Well," Mom said with a smile, "I hope you make it to where you’re going. It sounds like you both deserve it."
"Thank you, Mrs. Summers," Darius said, real gentlemanlike. "We thank you for your hospitality."
"I was glad to help, even if it was somewhat unexpected," she said, looking straight at her.
"Bus. Ted," Faith chuckled.
Colene and Darius grinned at that. Dawn just rolled her eyes and changed the subject. "Say, you know that this traveling carnival or whatever showed up, right?" The Mode guys nodded. "Well, me, Bri, Deb, and some of the other guys are tagging along with Steve and Buffy; they’re going to talk to that Isolde lady for info on the nasties from that world. You guys wanna come with?"
*****
Faith watched the newbies look at each other. She knew that look; mind reading stuff. No big. But it looked like C-Girl was a little reluctant to let herself go and do some "kid" stuff.
"Hey, look at it this way," the Slayer drawled, picking at her food. "You go, yo