Fan Fiction ❯ Quickened ❯ The Dying of the Light ( Chapter 20 )

 

They made their way determinedly through the Roman streets - Buffy, Kennedy, Vi, Rona, Xander, Andrew, and some twelve additional Slayers, all armed to the teeth - heading for the Vatican City. Most of the humans had fled for the dubious safety of the in doors, and those who hadn't were now dead. The streets now belonged to the monsters.

 

And the Slayers.

 

A trail of dead demons and zombies lay in their wake, punctuated by patches of dust that marked the final resting place of the vampires.

 

Before them lay the entrance to the Vatican City. The ground within was littered with corpses, and a pillar of pale energy pierced the sky, flowing upwards from a ruined cathedral.

 

And there, waiting for them at the entrance to the Vatican City, were HUNDREDS of demons and vampires.

 

Buffy smiled grimly. “Here we go.”

 

----------------------------

 

Quickened

by P.H. Wise

A Buffy crossover fanfic

 

Chapter 16: The Dying of the Light

 

Disclaimer: I don't own Buffy. I don't own Angel. I don't own Highlander. Please don't sue me. I'm only a poor starving writer. I have no money.

 

-----------------------------

 

Consciousness returned to Dawn slowly. It was dark, and she was cold. There, at the edge of her awareness, a cancerous muttering, the dim mutterings of an alien intelligence finally stirring from its long slumber. Shivering upon the cold, stone floor, Dawn opened her eyes. Pale, ghostly light swam across her vision, mixed with strange fixtures, beams, and pillars. For a moment, she stared at the ceiling, not understanding what she was seeing. When understanding came, it was not a comfort. She was within a binding circle, although the symbol on the floor, painted in blood, looked like no pentagram she had ever seen. `Elder Sign,' her mind supplied distantly, though that didn't make any sense. The pale light was the wall of her makeshift cell - the wall that shot off through a hole in the roof into the sky - and the fixtures, beams, and pillars were the features of the room - a grand hall of worship in the Vatican City, once a holy place, consecrated to God, but now desecrated and most foul. Off to the side lay the bodies of the Pope and many of his cardinals, still and cold.

 

Rubbing her eyes, and trying to fight her growing sense of dread, Dawn rose to her feet.

 

An altar stood before her, its Christian trappings stripped away, now every bit as desecrated as the building itself, covered in queer markings and malignantly suggestive symbols. Upon the altar lay a body - a man, with pale skin, dark hair, and pleasant features. There were four bookstands arranged in a semi-circle around the elder sign that held her in place, upon which such tomes as Kitab al Azif, the Pnakotic Manuscript, the Book of Eibon, and the Ponape Scriptures were careful placed, and a vampire stood before each book, all of them eyeing her hungrily, but unable to reach her thanks to the same binding circle that kept her prisoner.

 

“Ah, Dawnie, you're awake!” came a vaguely familiar voice. “Do you mind if I call you Dawnie?”

 

Dawn followed the line of the sound with her eyes until she saw the vampire that had killed Buffy that one time - blonde hair, casually dressed, even now - Alisoun.

 

She didn't answer the vampire's question.

 

If Alisoun was bothered by it, she made no sign.

 

“Why am I here?” Dawn asked, her voice unwavering.

 

Alisoun smiled. “Well, there's the thing. I need you to be the Key for me, Dawnie.”

 

She shook her head. “I'm not the Key anymore. Or if I am, I don't open anything anymore. Glory already tried and failed, and it was kinda a one time deal.”

 

“I'm afraid you're totally, utterly wrong, little girl. Being the Key isn't something you grow out of, like pimples or adolescence. It isn't just a phase of your existence. It IS your existence, Dawnie. It's the being human thing that's just a phase for you - a phase that will be over soon. We're going to wake up an Old One together, you and I. Or at least, close enough.”

 

Dawn's expression hardened. “My sister is so going to kill you.”

 

Alisoun laughed. “Maybe so. But that won't help you, my lovely little Key. It's almost time for you to go to sleep: almost time for your real self to wake up. But I think we've at least got time enough for a bedtime story.” Her tone brightened noticeably. “Do you want a story before bedtime, Dawnie?”

 

Dawn clenched her fists, and Alisoun laughed.

 

“This is an old story, but then, you're kinda of an old story kind of girl, now aren't you? It goes a little bit like this.” Alisoun nodded to a female vampire who stood before the Kitab al Azif.

 

The vampire immediately began to read aloud from the pages, and though the words were Arabic, all those who heard them understood them. “The Old Ones were, the Old Ones are, and the Old Ones shall be. Not in the spaces we know, but between them, They walk serene and primal, undimensioned and to us unseen.”

 

“Listen closely to the next part, Dawnie,” Alisoun said, holding up a finger, “Because this concerns you.”

 

“Yog-Sothoth knows the gate. Yog-Sothoth is the gate. Yog-Sothoth is the Key and guardian of the gate. Past, present, future, all are one in Yog-Sothoth. She knows where the Old Ones broke through of old, and where They shall break through again. She knows where They have trod earth's fields, and where They still tread them, and why no one can behold Them as They tread.”

 

--------------------------

 

A dozen crossbow bolts sailed out across the gap between the Slayers and the waiting vampires and demons. It was the second volley that they had loosed, and it served its purpose well - the ranks had been thinned. But there wasn't time for another.

 

The Slayers met their enemy in tight formation, falling upon the demonic ranks like a whirlwind. A dozen vampires fell in the first few seconds, six more a few seconds later. All too soon, however, the momentum of the charge was halted, and the melee began in earnest, with Buffy and the other Slayers fighting in close as Xander and Andrew hung back, armed with crossbows, to provide some ranged support. Overhead, Andrew's summoned flying monkeys were being a general nuisance to the forces of evil (which he took great pride in), and causing some minor disruption in the ranks of vampires and demons.

 

But they were a long way from getting to Dawn in the heart of the Vatican.

 

With the Scythe, Buffy was more effective than the others, but even so, the progress was slow.

 

Too slow.

 

-----------------------

 

“By Their smell can men sometimes know Them near, but of Their semblance can no man know, saving only in the features of those They have begotten on mankind; and of those are there many sorts, differing in likeness from man's truest eidolon to that shape without sight or substance which is Them.”

 

The words had taken on a peculiar kind of power, twisting and writhing beneath the surface of Dawn's mind. The dim flutterings of the alien consciousness began to grow louder. She grit her teeth and set her will to resisting it.

 

“They walk unseen and foul in lonely places where the Words have been spoken and the Rites howled through at their Seasons.”

 

“Why are you telling me this!?” Dawn demanded, now very nearly at a point of true desperation.

 

Alisoun smiled. “Weren't you listening? This is your bedtime story, Dawnie. It's time to go to sleep. Time to wake up.”

 

------------------------

 

“Buffy,” Xander called, “Go! Save Dawn! We'll handle this!”

 

Buffy hesitated, and then ducked underneath the swing of a demon's axe, hamstrung the beast, and then decapitated it all in one smooth motion. “You sure?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“Um, Buffy!” Andrew called frantically.

 

Buffy didn't glance his way, but did tilt her head. He took that as a sign to continue.

 

“Whatever you do, don't let them wake up the big evil soul eater guy. That girl in Colorado, she showed me... it would be really bad.”

 

“Right.”

 

“Buffy...” Andrew said, his voice thick with a nameless dread.

 

Buffy sensed it in his voice - this wasn't just one of those things that Andrew said. She met his gaze, and she nodded.

 

-------------------------

 

“The wind gibbers with Their voices, and the earth mutters with Their consciousness. They bend the forest and crush the city, yet may not forest or city behold the hand that smites.”

 

“Kadath in the cold waste hath known Them, and what man knows Kadath? The ice desert of the South and the sunken isles of Ocean hold stones whereon Their seal is engraven, but who hath seen the deep frozen city or the sealed tower long garlanded with seaweed and barnacles? Great Cthulhu is Their cousin, yet can he spy Them only dimly.”

 

--------------------------

 

Far away, in the City of Angels, Illyria's eyes opened suddenly, and she looked towards the east. Her eyes met Wesley's.

 

“You told me to go back,” she said, “To sleep until the humans are gone.”

 

“Yes.”

 

“Something stirs. An Old One but not. Perhaps today will be the day of humanity's end.”

 

Wesley frowned. After a few minute's thought, he picked up the phone, and dialed Angel's cell phone.

 

-----------------------

 

“Iä! Shub-Niggurath! As a foulness shall ye know Them. Their hand is at your throats, yet ye see Them not; and Their habitation is even one with your guarded threshold. Yog-Sothoth is the Key to the gate, whereby the spheres meet. Man rules now where They ruled once; They shall soon rule where man rules now. After summer is winter, and after winter summer. They wait patient and potent, for here shall They rule again.”

 

-----------------------

 

“Mr. Dawson?” Angel asked as he stepped into the conference room where Joe and Duncan were waiting. Two mugs of coffee lay on the table before them, Watcher and Immortal, and both mugs untouched, long since gone cold.

 

Joe turned.

 

“We've found him.”

 

At that moment, Angel's cell phone began to ring.

 

-----------------------

 

The first vampire closed her book and stepped back, and the second one, before the Book of Eibon stepped forward.

 

And he began to read.

 

Passages were read aloud. Blasphemous phrases, filled with darkness and madness. Full of writhing things and things that had learned to walk that ought to crawl. The Book of Eibon. The Pnakotic Manuscript. The Ponape Scriptures. And more from Kitab al Azif. The power of the words took form, and maddening images swirled before Dawn's horrified eyes, even as the consciousness of the Thing within took shape and began to grow.

Even as her humanity began to evaporate.

 

And Dawn Summers fell into darkness.

 

-----------------------

 

Gunn led Angel, Spike, Joe, and Duncan into the Wolfram and Hart corporate garage, moving confidently towards the car that they were to take.

 

“I started flipping through the brain files as soon as Harmony told me. Figured there had to be some kind of precedent.”

 

“And?” Angel asked.

 

“Senior partners had trouble with a guy in the Tokyo division way back. Lindsey probably got the tattoo idea from studying up on him.”

 

Angel nodded. “And wherever they sent this guy, that's where Lindsey is.”

 

“Yep.”

 

Joe spoke up, then. “And our friend is in the same place?”

 

Gunn nodded. “Yep. Same place, different holding cell.”

 

“I hope it's a toy poodle hell,” said Spike. “I've had my fill of fire.”

 

“It's not hell. It's a Wolfram & Hart holding dimension.”

 

Angel chuckled. “Meaning what - senior partners haven't decided what to do with Lindsey?”

 

“Their version of a penalty box.”

 

“Great. So... how are you supposed to get there?”

 

“Aren't you coming?” Gunn asked.

 

Angel shook his head. “There's something big going down in Rome.”

 

Duncan and Joe exchanged glances.

 

Spike immediately stopped in his tracks, glaring death at Angel. “And you forgot to mention this before because...?”

 

“I wanted to make sure you'd go with Gunn. He's gonna need your help, Spike.”

 

“I think you just want the chance to meet up with Buffy without my being there.”

 

“Well, there's that too.”

 

Duncan blinked. “The two of you know Buffy?”

 

Angel and Spike both turned towards Duncan, surprise clearly evident on their faces. They each took a moment to size up the Scottsman before answering in unison, brows furrowed in suspicion, “How do you know Buffy?”

 

Gunn tapped a finger to his watch. “Don't have any time to spare here.”

 

Spike glared at both Angel and Duncan... and then sighed and nodded. “Fine. But next time Buffy's in danger, *I* get to go rescue her.”

 

Angel nodded. “Deal.”

 

---------------------------

 

Alisoun's smile took on a note of triumph as Dawn slumped to the ground within her binding circle. “I think we're ready to finish this.”

 

“You ain't kiddin',” Buffy replied as she stepped through the massive double doors. She held the scythe in her hands, and the dusty remains of the two vampires on guard duty still drifted faintly in the air around her. She took in the scene in the chapel, and her expression hardened, and her eyes narrowed dangerously. “What have you done to my sister?”

 

Alisoun shrugged. “Hastened the process a little. I think it's about time she grew out of this whole `human' phase, don't you?”

 

Buffy's face became as stone, and she raised the scythe to do battle.

 

And the vampires began to chant.

 

-------------------------

 

She descended through an endless sea of black ichor, sinking ever deeper into darkness. Queer, wriggling things brushed against her form, and the ichor itself took shape, sprouting mouths and fangs and claws and teeth, birthing itself into a million forms of new life and old life.

 

Dawn continued to sink.

 

Finally, she reached the bottom, and fell through with a sick wet noise to the ground below. Above her floated the sea of dark life, and all around, as far as her eyes could see, were massive, floating, malignantly suggestive iridescent orbs, each one several miles across.

 

In the distance, four voices chanted in unison, speaking a language never meant to be pronounced by human tongues, and never meant to be heard by human ears. “N'gai, n'gha'ghaa, bugg-shoggog, y'hah;” they intoned, “Yog-Sothoth, Yog-Sothoth.”

 

A ripple of light spread across the iridescent spheres, and Dawn stared at it in rapt fascination for a long moment.

 

Abruptly, a woman spoke close at hand, and although she had never seen her before, she recognized the woman immediately. Brown hair with blue streaks, metallic blue eyes, reptilian mannerisms, and clad all in leather, Illyria stood before her. Somewhere behind Dawn was a warm light. She didn't turn to face it, yet there it remained.

 

“Your current situation is intolerable,” the Old One informed her dispassionately.

 

“You're tellin' me?”

 

“I am glad you agree. End this, then. End this and take the power that is yours by right.”

 

Dawn blinked. “... Huh?”

 

A faint look of annoyance flashed across the Old One's face. “I see that this will take a while. Perhaps too long.”

 

-----------------------

 

Pleasant two story homes with white picket fences stretched for as far as the eye could see, every one of them exactly the same as every other one, with shingle roofs, green lawns, and rose gardens. The sun shone brightly overhead, and the sky was as blue as it could be without shifting into ultraviolet. Birds chirped pleasantly to one another across the suburban landscape, and a slight breeze brought the warmth of the sun down to a more comfortable level.

 

Before one of these excessively pleasant homes stood Duncan MacLeod and Joe Dawson, both appearing slightly nonplused.

 

“So... this is hell,” said Joe, his tone showing that he thought his pronouncement to be somewhat dubious in nature.

 

Duncan smiled faintly. “I thought there'd be fire. Or at least torture and screaming.”

 

Joe shrugged. “I guess not. You ready to do this?”

 

Duncan nodded. Side by side, they approached the door of the home before them.

 

-----------------------

 

Buffy wasted no time trading blows. When she struck, she struck to cripple or to kill. It was a testament to Alisoun's sheer fighting ability that she wasn't destroyed after the first five moves. The vampire leaped over the scythe's sweeping arc, barely avoiding having her legs severed at the knees, only to drop flat to the ground to avoid the follow up jab with the scythe's stake-end that would have reduced her to so much dust had it landed.

 

Hard-eyed and fell, Buffy fought on, determined to save, or if not save, at least avenge, her sister.

 

As she fought, the other four vampires spoke as one, four voices chanting in unison, speaking a language never meant to be pronounced by human tongues, and never meant to be heard by human ears. “N'gai, n'gha'ghaa, bugg-shoggog, y'hah;” they intoned, “Yog-Sothoth, Yog-Sothoth.”

 

And a sickly green light began to seep out of Dawn's fallen body.

 

----------------------

 

Duncan had wondered what exactly these `Senior Partners' could possibly do to Methos to make him see things their way. Now, confronted with the reality of it, his heart sank into his feet.

 

Alexa had answered the door. Vibrant, and full of life, and clad in a yellow sundress, she'd answered the door, her voice ringing with the clear, jubilant tone of one who loves life as she asked, “Can I help you?”

 

Both Duncan and Joe stared in mute shock, neither quite sure of what to do. After a moment, Duncan spoke, and thanks to long centuries of practice, managed to keep the surprise out of his voice. “Is Adam here?”

 

Alexa nodded. “Yes, he's out back. Are you friends of his?”

 

Duncan nodded, smiling pleasantly. “Very old friends.”

 

Alexa smiled. “Well then, come in, come in. I'll just go get Adam.” She turned and headed back inside, and the two men followed her in, shutting the door behind them.

 

Duncan tried to ignore that sinking feeling like the ground had just fallen out from under him.

 

-----------------------

 

“Seize the power for your own, girl,” said Illyria, her metallic blue eyes boring into Dawn's own. “Seize the power and become what you were meant to be. Ye shall be as a god. Even the rulers of hell and the abyss will quail before your might.”

 

Dawn frowned. As tempting as it was, something about this seemed wrong, somehow. She could almost FEEL fortune's wheel turning, though whether to raise her up or grind her into the dust, she couldn't say. “I...”

 

“Exactly,” said Illyria.

 

For a moment, Dawn seemed to grow, a terrible power gathering all around her. Her shadow lengthened, and there was a hidden menace in her eyes.

 

For a moment.

 

And then she was Dawn. Just Dawn.

 

“Why do you cling to your tattered humanity? It is a shadow. A bit of smoke that will soon be blown away in the wind.”

 

Dawn said nothing.

 

Distantly, the chant echoed a second time: “N'gai, n'gha'ghaa, bugg-shoggog, y'hah; Yog-Sothoth, Yog-Sothoth.” The iridescent spheres rippled.

 

Illyria grew angry. “How can you live within such a feeble, pitiful shell? How can you breathe? There is no room for anything real in that world. Why do you wallow in such emotions? Allow your behavior to be affected by mere chemicals, seeping through your human brain?”

 

“It's all I've ever known.”

 

“Perhaps. But you can seize a much higher destiny. Reach out your hand and take it, young one. Do you want to die, swallowed up in your greater self, a dissolute shadow within a consciousness so alien to your kind that knowing it would break your feeble mind?”

 

Dawn's voice wavered, and her terror was clearly evident. She shook her head. “No, I don't want to die.”

 

The warm light behind the girl grew slightly brighter, and ever so faintly, a gentle, familiar voice whispered, “Dawn...”

 

Dawn didn't turn towards it.

 

“Then don't. Reach out your hand and take that power. Use it to crush your enemies. You will be as a god to these pathetic mortals. They shall come and worship you, sacrificing themselves and one another for your pleasure. And you shall be Unchained. Free to travel the infinite worlds as you please, to walk worlds of smoke and half-truths, intangible. Worlds of torment and of unnamable beauty. Opaline towers as high as small moons. Glaciers that ripple with insensate lust. All of this can be yours.”

 

The dream that she had had what seemed like so long ago flickered in her mind for a moment. Buffy, Faith, chained before her, being sacrificed for her pleasure. All people the world across coming to worship her. For a moment, it actually seemed appealing. For a moment, she wanted it. But then what was left of her humanity reasserted itself, and she screamed, “NO!”

 

The denial reverberated throughout the iridescent spheres and through the lake of dark life, rumbling and echoing endlessly. After a few moments, the echoes pitched upwards, becoming a shrill whine, and then a pressure on the ears, and then nothing at all.

 

Illyria cocked her head, as if still listening to those echoes that had passed beyond the human range of hearing. “If you will not choose to continue your existence, I can not help you. Fall into Yog-Sothoth and be no more, Dawn Summers. Your end is only moments away.”

 

Illyria vanished, leaving Dawn alone with the spheres, and the black sea, and the warm light.

 

Dawn fell to her knees, sobbing.

 

-------------------------

 

Methos walked into the living room with a smile on his face. “Joe! MacLeod!” he called cheerfully, “To what do I owe the honor?”

 

The house looked excessively pleasant, with nice furniture, tasteful decorations, tasteful wallpaper... the only thing that really looked out of place was that the door leading to the basement had been boarded up.

 

Duncan looked around at the pleasant, suburban home. “We, ah, came to rescue you?”

 

An awkward silence fell, then, broken a few moments later by Methos' laughter. “I appreciate the gesture, MacLeod, but I don't need to be rescued.”

 

Duncan looked hopelessly lost for a few moments, exchanged glances with Joe, and then shrugged helplessly.

 

“Care for a beer?” Methos asked.

 

“Uh... Sure.”

 

Methos went off to the kitchen, followed closely by his wife, leaving Duncan and Joe alone in the living room.

 

“What do you think?” Duncan asked as soon as they were out of earshot.

 

Joe looked thoughtful for a long moment, and then shook his head wearily. “I think we should leave it alone.”

 

MacLeod frowned. “He's a prisoner, he just doesn't know it. And you heard the recording of his kidnapping. `Let's just say we have a place prepared for you?' `Somewhere you'll have time to think?' `Clear your head?' `Until you come around to our way of thinking?' Any of this sounding familiar, Joe?”

 

Joe looked as though he'd swallowed a lemon. “Leave it be, Mac.”

 

“It's wrong, Joe. It's not real. We have to help him.”

 

“But he's happy...”

 

Methos stepped back into the living room, then, carrying three bottles of beer, and his expression was hard. “I see,” he said. Both Joe and Duncan turned to face him.

 

Alexa stood at the door, her expression unreadable.

 

“You heard?”

 

“I heard.”

 

Duncan nodded faintly. “You know that none of this is real, don't you?”

 

“I know.”

 

“Then come with us. We need you back in the real world, Methos.”

 

Methos placed the beers on the coffee table and crossed his arms. “No.”

 

Duncan grew angry. “But it's not real! You're a slave to these illusions!”

 

Methos smiled faintly, but there was a hint of bitterness to it. “Aren't we all?” he asked.

 

Duncan's anger faltered, and he frowned.

 

“I met Buddha, once, you know. I even traveled with him for a while.”

 

Joe raised an eyebrow. He couldn't help himself, he had to ask, “What was he like?”

 

“Nice guy. He had good ideas. Despite what you may have heard otherwise, he was just a guy. He knew a few things, sure, but he was still just a guy.” Methos shrugged. “But if all of life is an illusion, what does it matter whether I embrace this particular one? I'm happy here.”

 

“It's an awfully uncertain happiness, Methos. These `senior partners' could snatch it away from you any time they like. What will you do then? What if they're only allowing you to experience this in order to make you willing to do anything, even become Death again, to keep it?”

 

“All happiness is uncertain, Mac. All happiness might end at any moment.”

 

Joe spoke, then. He could see quite clearly that this line of argument wasn't getting anywhere, so he tried another. “There are people out there who need you, Methos. People who are counting on you.”

 

Alexa's voice cut through the argument like a knife. “I think you should go, Adam,” she said, her voice filled with sadness.

 

Her words caught Methos just as he was opening his mouth to speak. He sputtered, turned towards her, and stared for a moment. “What?”

 

Alexa smiled sadly. “I'm not her, you know. I can never be her. And you'll never really be happy with me. Not really.”

“But...”

 

Duncan and Joe were both shocked by her words, and said nothing.

 

“Go, Adam.”

 

“Come with me.”

 

Alexa shook her head. “I cannot leave this place. My contract with Wolfram and Hart binds me here. But you, you can leave. And you should.”

 

Methos stood in silence for a long moment.

 

Finally, he stepped forward, wrapped his arms around the demon that had taken his wife's form, and kissed her passionately.

 

“I love you,” she whispered, just as the kiss broke. She was crying now.

 

He smiled sadly, and tears were forming in his eyes. “I know,” he said. A demon loved him. Really loved him. And God help him, for all that she said otherwise, and for all that he knew that she wasn't really Alexa, he loved her back. “What about the Wrath?” he asked.

 

Alexa wiped her eyes, but the tears wouldn't stop. At length, she smiled thinly and said, “Leave him to me.”

 

-------------------------------

 

Dawn kneeled alone before the iridescent spheres beneath the sea of dark life, weeping. Illyria had not returned, and she knew that it would not be long now before she was no more. And still the warm light glowed just behind her. And still she did not turn.

 

The warm light behind the girl grew slightly brighter, and ever so faintly, a gentle, familiar voice whispered once again, “Dawn...”

 

At last, she turned.

 

Her eyes widened.

 

There, surrounded by the brilliance of Love and robed all in white, stood Joyce Summers.

 

“Mommy?” Dawn whispered, scarcely able to believe her eyes.

 

Joyce smiled. “Hello, Dawn.”

 

Dawn tried to race to her mother. Tried to run to her and hug her with all her strength. But her strength had failed her, and she collapsed.

 

Joyce went to her and scooped Dawn up into her strong, gentle arms. A mother's arms. “Oh, Dawnie,” she whispered, “I'm so sorry.”

 

Dawn clung to her mother, then, weeping. “Mommy, I was so scared...”

 

“Listen to me, Dawn. I love you, but you don't have much time.”

 

Dawn looked up at Joyce. “Why is this happening?”

 

“You know.”

 

Dawn fell silent for a moment. “... It's because I'm not real.”

 

Joyce nodded sadly. “Yes.”

 

Dawn didn't say anything to that.

 

“But you have a chance to become real, Dawn. And your other self, the old one, has a chance for redemption.”

 

Dawn's eyes burned now with hope. “How?” she asked.

 

Four voices echoed across the spheres yet again, chanting in unison. “N'gai, n'gha'ghaa, bugg-shoggog, y'hah; Yog-Sothoth, Yog-Sothoth.”

 

Dawn shuddered, and ripples spread across the spheres again. Only this time, the ripples didn't stop. They began to grow ever more intense.

 

“You have to die, Dawn.”

 

“WHAT!?”

 

“You have to willingly surrender to death. In order to be saved, you must willingly make the long, slow descent into nonentity. Only after you have willingly relinquished your self can that self be saved.”

 

“I don't understand...”

 

Joyce smiled sadly. “Dawn, listen very carefully, because I'm not allowed to help you any more after I tell you this. Are you ready?”

 

Dawn nodded.

 

“Unless a seed go into the ground and die...” Joyce trailed off, and became silent.

 

Dawn looked at her mother for a long moment. Indecision plagued her, and doubts flocked about her like birds. At length, however, she nodded. “What do I have to do?”

 

Joyce held out her hand, and a great tunnel of light appeared behind her. “Take my hand, and come with me.”

 

She took her mother's hand, and together they walked into the light. Everything blurred around her in furious motion... and then she stood on the tower.

 

The tower.

 

And the blood flowed freely from her wounds.

 

And the portal crackled beneath her.

 

And the sun was rising in the distance.

 

She jumped, and she fell. Graceful, beautiful, she fell.

 

And Dawn Summers died.

 

----------------------------

 

In the hall of worship, beneath the elder sign, Dawn's body burst into a huge, malignantly suggestive iridescent orb. There was an intense flash of green light, and then it was gone.

 

“DAWN!” Buffy screamed.

 

“Too late, Slayer!” Alisoun crowed in triumph. “Too late! Your sister is gone, and I've won!”

Buffy's next blow cleaved Alisoun in twain at the waist, and the vampire's torso slowly slid off of her legs and fell to the ground with a thump. “Maybe,” said the Slayer, her voice as cold as death, “But you won't live to see your victory.”

 

Alisoun looked down in shock. “What...? But I won...!”

And then Buffy shoved the reverse end of the scythe into the vampiric Slayer's heart.

 

Alisoun burst apart in a cloud of dust, and was no more.

 

But she had spoken truly. It was indeed too late. With the release of Dawn's energies as the Key, the seals keeping Eater of Souls chained were broken.

 

At that moment, Willow finished her protection spell. A great wind rushed out across the city, and each of its targets felt a sudden sense of warmth and security.

 

The elder sign upon which Dawn had been bound shattered, and stone chips flew in every direction. And then a torrent of black energy erupted up out of it. The roof disintegrated. The building disintegrated. The vampires who had been chanting were blasted to ash. And the power of Eater of Souls reached out across the city, consuming everything it touched, fuel for the flames of rebirth.

 

But Buffy, protected by Willow's spell, stood fast. There, upon the altar, a figure was rising.

 

“Oh no you don't!” the Slayer yelled as she rushed towards the figure. She raised the Scythe, and then swung down, decapitating Eater of Souls in one smooth movement, and long before he had fully awakened.

 

Buffy grinned a feral grin. “No apocalypse for you, Buddy,” she informed the headless corpse.

 

And that was when the quickening hit her, shattering through Willow's protection spell as if it were glass. As her every nerve exploded in agony, Buffy reflected, “Maybe this wasn't such a good idea...!”

 

And the black energy didn't stop. It flowed out from the shattered seal, but now, without Eater of Souls to flow into, it went into the Slayer.

 

Waves of destructive energy pulsed out from the Vatican City, vast tendrils forming and stretching across Rome, pulsing and writhing grotesquely, like bloated, corpulent veins. Buildings crumbled, and explosions rocked the city. And all across Rome, hundreds of thousands of humans literally exploded in showers of gore, and a small mote of white light rose from each steaming pile of blood and guts, each of them absorbed by the energy-tendrils with an agonized scream.

 

Death had come to Rome, and only those upon whom Willow had placed her protection were spared.

 

And in the chapel, Buffy's screams echoed endlessly as her eyes slowly darkened to black.

 

-----------------------

 

Far away, in the home that she and Methos had once shared, the demon in Alexa's form sat and wept. Methos had gone. His friends had gone. She was alone with the Wrath.

 

And that was when the Senior Partners made their move.

 

Blue light flashed in her eyes, and the demon screamed in agony as the human soul of Alexa entered her body, and she collapsed.

 

Silence hung over the house for a few long moments.

 

And then Alexa sat up, looked around, and asked, “... Adam?”

 

The silence of the empty house was her only answer.

 

END CHAPTER 16

 

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