Twenty-Two

THIS IS HOW THE WORLD ENDS

They stood around the coffee table, looking down at the Key.

“Tara,” Buffy said. “Okay, I know you’re a witch and everything? But are you absolutely sure? Are you absolutely sure this isn’t the Key?”

“If Tara says it isn’t then it isn’t,” Faith said. “What’s a glamour?”

“A glamour is an illusion spell,” Tara said. “It makes something appear to be something else. The thing about a glamour though is that it doesn’t change the object itself, it changes the way we see it. This Key thing here? It’s a brick. You’re all seeing it as the Key because the glamour is affecting your minds, but I can see through the spell.”

“Willow’s a witch and she’s been looking at this thing since Friday,” Buffy said. “Why didn’t she see through it?”

When Buffy looked Tara in the eyes, Tara looked away.

“It’s like, r-r-really super hard, s-seeing through a glamour?” Tara said. “It takes a lot of practice and I’ve been d-doing magic since I was thirteen. And okay, we have zero time? So I’m gonna make this quick. I’m gonna undo the glamour.”

“How long will that take?” Angel said, as Tara closed her eyes, and waved her hand over the Key.

“It’s done,” Tara said...and, suddenly, the Key was gone.

In its place there was a brick lying on the coffee table.

“I am gonna shove this thing up Spike’s ass,” Angel growled.

“What do we do?” Tara said. “We need like, like a plan, right?”

“Spike must have made this fake so he could sell the Key twice,” Angel said. “Double his profits. Little frigging weasel.”

“Maybe he made a fake because he doesn’t wanna end the world?” Faith said. “Maybe he’s keeping the real Key and he won’t let the bad guys get it?”

“Or maybe he doesn’t know what it can do and he was just trying to double-dip,” Buffy said. “The bad guys might already have the real Key now.”

“They probably have it,” Angel said. “Think about it. They haven’t attacked us since Saturday because they didn’t need to. If the First found out everything you know once she took your form she would’ve known we had the Key here and she would’ve told those vamps. But the vamps never came at the house. They never came at us because they already knew we had a fake. They played us.”

“The First?” Tara said.

“The First Evil,” Faith said. “Supposed to be like, the evilest, most bad ass thing in the universe. It’s been doggin’ us, disguising itself as people we know, tryin’ to screw with our heads.”

“Great,” Tara said. “Because this situation really wouldn’t have been complete without the evilest thing in the universe in our faces too.”

“It can’t touch us,” Angel said. “It’s incorporeal. And it can only appear as people who have died.”

“Which basically means vamps or me,” Buffy said.

“You?” Tara said. “But, um, you’re alive. I mean you...are alive, right? I mean this isn’t like some Sixth Sense thing, right?”

“I died last year, got revived after like a minute,” Buffy said, and smiled at Tara’s consternation. “Long story. Have you guys called Willow?”

“We kept getting a busy signal,” Tara said. “I offered to drive over there and go get them all, but, um, Angel wouldn’t let me leave the house.”

“Angel made the right call, honey,” Faith said. “Those vamps know you now, it’s too dangerous for you outside. Okay. We gotta find Spike, right now.”

Buffy took Angel’s rum and Diet Coke, and drank the whole thing down like it was water. Then she poured herself another.

“What are you doing?” Faith said.

“World’s ending,” Buffy said. “I want a drink.”

Faith took it away from her.

“We’re working,” Faith said. “Okay, here’s the plan. We gotta assume the bad guys have the Key. We have Spike’s number, we’ll call him. Better if we could find him without tipping him off first because I sure don’t trust the bastard, but we’re outta time. Maybe Spike can tell us where the ceremony’s going down.”

“I could do a locator spell if you guys have anything of his,” Tara said.

“There’s no time,” Buffy said.

“I only need a few minutes,” Tara said.

Tara felt Buffy looking at her. She didn’t look back. Buffy’s stare made her uncomfortable.

“A few minutes?” Faith said. “Will always took two hours at least.”

“I know a shortcut,” Tara said. “Do we have anything of Spike’s?”

“Unfortunately,” Buffy said. “Gimme two seconds.”

She ran out of the house, grabbed the shopping bag from the car, and ran back in. She dumped the contents of the shopping bag out on the coffee table.

“Please tell me that’s not Spike’s underwear,” Angel said.

“Looking for clues sucks,” Buffy said.

“Let’s cut the chatter now, time’s wastin’,” Faith said. “Tara, you need anything to do the spell?”

“Got everything in my bag,” Tara said.

“Okay hon, get to it,” Faith said. Tara dumped her shoulder bag out on the floor, and knelt down cross-legged beside three tupperware bowls full of powder and herbs, six candles, a pack of spearmint gum, cheese and crackers, a Walkman, headphones, her leather pouch with her tarot cards inside, a disposable camera, four pens, a pair of tinted sunglasses, a Walter Mosley paperback called White Butterfly, a school notebook with Snoopy doodles on the cover, her beautiful white leatherbound spell book with a silver silk bookmark sewn in and its pages all gilt in silver too, and a yellow plastic lighter.

“Buffy,” Faith said. “Try Will again, tell her what’s going on.”

Buffy suddenly felt strange. She’d told Faith she didn’t want to lead anymore...and now she was realizing that she wasn’t the leader...

Faith was.

Without meaning to, Buffy hesitated.

She felt Angel looking at her. She looked back at him, and saw the question in his eyes, and looked away from it.

“Um, yeah...okay,” Buffy said, and was about to move to the telephone.

Faith took her hand.

“Buffy,” Faith said. “Remember our talk, honey? One of us has to lead. But it doesn’t matter to me which one it is. Want me to step back? Say the word.”

Buffy kissed her. Tara looked away, and concentrated intently on arranging her magic powder and her candles.

“Nope,” Buffy said, and smiled. “I’ll do whatever you say, boss.” She ran to the telephone.

“Okay, Angel,” Faith said. “B and me are gonna go after Spike once Tara tracks him. If we luck out then maybe he hasn’t sold the Key to those priests yet. This thing goes south? You and Tara take Tara’s car, scoop up Will and Giles and Xander, get everyone someplace safe and hunker down.”

“I’m ready,” Tara said. “Someone throw me that gross thing.”

Faith looked over at her. “Don’t you need a map of the town?”

“A map?” Tara said. “For what?”

“For the spell. Will uses a map to like, pin down what she’s looking for.”

“It’s all up here, sweetie,” Tara said, and pointed at her forehead.

Faith picked up the underwear using just the tips of her fingers, and set it down beside the bowl of magic blue powder. Three candles were set in a triangle pattern in front of Tara, and the bowl of powder was set in between them. Tara lit the candles with the yellow lighter, sprinkled some of the powder on Spike’s underwear, and closed her eyes...

“I don’t want to lose you,” Xander said.

Willow and Xander sat on the couch together, drinking coffee and super mocha cappuccino, and eating Oreo cookies with double stuff. Giles was in his study, giving them room, giving them time.

The television was off. Rob and Laura had gotten a happy ending. Willow wasn’t at all certain that she and Xander would get a happy ending.

But Willow was determined to try. If she was going to lose him, she would fight for him first.

“Then stop trying to change me,” Willow said.

“That’s not what I’m doing,” Xander said, and gulped down half of his coffee. Willow sipped her super mocha cappuccino.

“Feels that way to me.”

“Look, I know you think...I don’t know, that I’m like, intimidated by you, by how you’re all like this super Wicca goddess now. But I’m...I’m not. I just want you to be safe. And you’re not safe with Buffy.”

“Even though I can do like, energy shields, and fireballs and stuff?”

“Yeah. Even though you can do energy shields, and fireballs and stuff. You can still be hurt. You can still be killed. You can still...that thing that happened to you, it could still happen. And I love you, and...okay, I’m being a guy? But for Christ’s sake, you’re my girlfriend and it’s my responsibility to protect you.”

“So what you’re saying is, for the past couple of years when you were helping us out even though you didn’t have any powers at all, and like, you didn’t know how to fight at all either, or even use weapons? Then by your reasoning Buffy should’ve told you to stay home, right?”

“That’s not...I just...wanted to help out.”

“Xander, did you ever think that the real reason Buffy lets you help is because she knows it would break your heart if she didn’t? Yeah, you’re her friend and she cares about you. Well, she could’ve cared about you just as much and made you stay home. But she didn’t. Because she knew it would hurt you not to be included. She let you help, even though she always had to worry about you, because she cares about you. It would’ve been so much easier for her to know you were home safe when the Big Bads all came to town, it would’ve been one less thing for her to worry about. Instead she let you help, and she took on the burden of having to worry about you, because she cares about you more than she cares about making things easier on herself.”

Xander chewed on that for awhile. He washed it down with the rest of his coffee.

“I really hate when you get all logical,” he finally said. “Xander smash puny logic.”

Willow giggled. He could always make her giggle. It was one of the reasons she knew she couldn’t live without him.

“Buffy sacrificed a lot for you, Xander,” Willow said. “I’m not talking about saving your life. I mean worrying about you. Constantly having it in the back of her mind--is this the night I get Xander killed? I know because she always told me. We’d do our sleepovers and stuff? And, y’know, girl talk? And every time, we’d always eventually talk about you, and she would tell me how afraid she was...afraid you would die. It made her cry sometimes.”

“It made her cry?” Xander said. “Worrying...worrying about me?”

“Yeah,” Willow said.

“I’m worried,” Buffy said. She was holding the phone in her hand.

“What is it?” Faith said, as she watched Tara meditating cross-legged on the floor. Tara wasn’t floating, the way Willow did when she performed a locator spell. But her pendant was glowing.

“I keep getting a busy signal,” Buffy said.

“Maybe Giles is on the phone,” Angel said.

“Still?” Buffy said. “Tara got a busy signal too. Giles hates the phone. And even if he was using it, or maybe Will and Xander are using it, he’s got call waiting.”

“I’ve got him,” Tara said.

All three of them looked down at her. Her eyes were still closed. And they seemed to be moving behind her eyelids.

“He’s in a...like a crypt, maybe?” Tara said. “I see torches...coffins. He’s wearing...a black leather trench coat. He has blonde hair...like, bleached blonde? Short...brushed back. He has the Key.”

“Spike,” Buffy said.

“There are...men, and...some sort of...” Tara still had her eyes closed, but she looked frightened now. “Some sort of...monsters...?” she whispered.

Faith knelt down beside her, and took her hand.

“I’m right here Tara,” Faith said. “No one hurts you when I’m around, okay honey?”

Tara nodded, and smiled, and relaxed. “The monsters...they’re guys with... weird foreheads and long teeth...noses like...like...dogs? Pointy ears.”

“Those are our vamps,” Faith said.

“There are...priests? Four old men dressed like priests...”

“Where, honey?” Faith said. “Put it together for me. Where are they?”

“I’m...going outside the crypt now...looking around,” Tara whispered. “I see...a statue of an angel...a female angel...she’s holding a sword in her hand...”

“Blue Hills Cemetery,” Buffy said. “With the car we can be there in like five minutes.”

“Call Spike,” Faith said.

“We call him, we tip him off that we know,” Angel said.

“Doesn’t matter now,” Faith said. “I’m betting Spike doesn’t know what the Key can do. If we’re lucky he helps us out. Worst case, he’s in on it? It’s not like he can speed the ceremony up. He’s gotta wait for the sun. Either way, we get there before the sun goes down and we take out shot.”

“Buffy better make the call,” Angel said. “If I call he’ll give those priests the Key just to spite me. But he kinda likes Buffy.”

“And again with the grossness,” Buffy said.

“Buffy, call him,” Faith said. “Tell that prick he’s about to blow up the fucking world.”

Spike was fairly pleased with himself.

He was going to make three-hundred thousand dollars today.

He stood in the shadowy crypt with his hands in the pockets of his long, black leather coat--the coat, he remembered fondly, that he had taken from the dead body of a Slayer he’d killed twenty years before--and felt the hunk of stone in his hand, and smirked at the four old priests and the strange, bestial vampires with the odd tattoos who stood behind them and glared at him.

He was going to make three-hundred thousand dollars today, and then he was going to find Drusilla, who’d had the unmitigated gall to run out on him, and torture her for awhile, until she liked him again. And after that, they’d go to Europe, maybe England, see the old stomping grounds. Perhaps they’d catch a football game; Manchester United was supposed to have a strong team next season. And then he and Dru would laugh and drink champagne and eat people, and she’d tell him she was his girl again and admit she was wrong for snogging Angelus last year, and maybe he’d buy her a nice dress.

Drusilla was his girl: she had made him. If she thought she could just leave him after more than a century, he’d just have to convince her otherwise. Repeatedly, and so it hurt. She liked when he hurt her. He liked it too.

“So substituting that fake wasn’t your idea?” the Priest of Wands said, looking at him darkly. But with a smile.

The smile worried Spike a bit. Spike had met a fair number of priests--actually, he had eaten them--and these four didn’t seem your normal variety. Especially the one with the golden wand around his neck. He smiled too much. Spike didn’t trust him. Priests were supposed to be dour, joyless old men: they never got laid, at least in theory. No, Spike definitely didn’t like this one. And he didn’t like the four vampires he brought with him either.

Despite all this, Spike’s smirk remained intact. He had spent decades practicing his various affectations: the petulance, the ironic detachment, the swagger, the Cockney accent, the bleached blonde hair, the coat and the smirk all worked together to create the exact impression he wanted, one that was quite the opposite of the appallingly sensitive, staggeringly naive poet he used to be, before his black beauty turned him. Spike used to be a ponce. Now he was dangerous. He preferred dangerous, all in all.

“Hard to find good help these days, padre,” Spike said, and took the Key from his coat pocket. The Priest of Wands immediately reached out for it; Spike snatched it back. The vampires growled at him.

“Money first,” Spike said. “And shut your dogs up before I have to neuter them.”

The Priest of Swords stepped forward with a briefcase. Spike thought the Priest of Swords looked just the way a priest should. He wasn’t smiling; he looked like he hadn’t been laid since the Eisenhower administration. The priest opened the briefcase. Spike’s smirk got even wider, as he saw his second favorite color: green, and lots of it.

That much green would buy a lot of champagne.

“First we examine the Key,” the Priest of Swords said.

The first few notes of the Sex Pistols’ “God Save the Queen” echoed through the crypt. The priests and the vampires jumped like an air raid siren had gone off.

Wankers, Spike thought.

Spike shook his head, and pulled his cell phone from his pocket.

“Spike!” Buffy shouted into the phone.

“Who is this?” Spike said. “How the hell did you get this number?”

“It’s Buffy!” Buffy shouted. “Listen!”

“Right,” Spike said. “Because you and me, we talk all the time.”

“Will you shut up and listen to me?! That rock you’re trying to sell? It can destroy the world!”

“I am so gonna kick his British ass,” Angel muttered darkly, sitting on the couch and drinking a Guinness. Tara sat next to him, drinking another rum and Diet Coke. Maybe Buffy was on the clock, but Tara wasn’t used to apocalypses and had come to the conclusion that she really, really didn’t like them, and she wanted something to calm her nerves, and preferably knock them unconscious. Faith sat next to her, on the arm of the couch, holding her hand.

“I want you to go easy on those, Tara,” Faith said. “Okay?”

“Okay, Mom,” Tara said, and smiled.

“Was I being impertinent?” Faith said, and raised her eyebrow, and smiled back at her.

Tara thought Faith had the most beautiful smile she had ever seen. Just then, it was so beautiful it made her want to cry.

“A little,” Tara said. “But you can be impertinent with me whenever you want, sweetie.”

“Gonna hold you to that,” Faith said.

“Girlfriend,” Spike said to the priests, and smiled. “Pretty thing, but a little daft.” He moved away from the priests and kept a wary eye on the vampires as he talked. Usually four against one was a nice, invigorating scrap in Spike’s book. But these vampires were different...

“Honey, Daddy’s in the middle of something really important right now, so I don’t know exactly when I’ll be home,” Spike said into the cell phone.

“That rock is a key to a dimensional gate,” Buffy said. “Those priests want to use it to free the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse!”

“You’re not wearing any underwear? Tell me more, you naughty girl.”

“If they get their hands on it the world will end! You have to keep the Key out of their hands until after the sun sets! Spike, please!”

“You want me to spank you? Why, you kinky little trollop.”

“Remember what you said last time? How you don’t want the world to end? Manchester United? People walking around like Happy Meals with legs?”

“Fine, fine. Just make sure my dinner’s on the table, woman.”

He broke the connection, and put the phone back in his pocket.

“I’m gonna stick my sword so far up his ass,” Buffy said, and slammed the phone down so hard she nearly broke it.

“Get in line,” Angel said.

“You get a read on him?” Faith said. “How did he sound? Will he help?”

“No fucking idea,” Buffy said. “He’s the most annoying vampire in the history of the world.”

“We got any weapons here?” Faith said.

“Got like six bottles of holy water in the duffel bag in the car,” Buffy said. “But that’s it. The flamethrowers are at Giles’ place.”

“No time to drive there,” Faith said.

“I have an extra sword,” Angel said. “My axe too if you want.”

“Thanks, but we got our swords,” Faith said. “And I don’t wanna leave you without your gear. No time to drive to Giles’ place either, so we’re gonna have to make do with what we got. Okay, let’s go, we’re almost outta time.” She stood up, and checked her sword and her stake. “Angel, remember the plan. If this thing goes off the rails you’ll know real quick. If it does and B and me somehow manage to avoid being vamp-chow we’ll contact you when we can. Don’t look for us, you and Tara have to go get Will and Xander and Giles. Take them somewhere safe.”

“Okay,” Angel said. “Be careful. Spike’s dangerous.”

“So are a hundred or so of those new wolf vamps,” Faith said. “Can’t be helped. Let’s move out, B.”

Tara stood up. “The world survives this? I’m buying you guys cell phones. “I’m buying us all cell phones. I’m buying us all ten cell phones each.”

“Thanks, girlfriend,” Faith said, and kissed Tara’s cheek. “I’ll see you soon, okay?”

Tara hugged her, and as she did, tears came into her eyes. She held the embrace, so she could wipe her tears away before Faith could see.

But when Tara looked up, she saw Buffy looking at her. It wasn’t an unfriendly look. Tara wasn’t sure what kind of look it was. But she couldn’t abide it; she flinched and looked down, and quickly brushed her tears away. Then she touched Faith’s cheek, and looked into her big brown eyes.

“You come back to me,” Tara whispered. “Or I’ll...or I’ll kick your butt.”

“I’ll be back,” Faith said. “I want more of your pancakes.”

“They’re completely lame,” Tara whispered.

“No they’re not,” Faith said, and kissed her forehead, and gently pulled away from her, and walked to the door.

Buffy and Tara were facing each other.

“Um...so...g-good luck, Buffy,” Tara mumbled. She flinched, as she met Buffy’s eyes. She held out her hand. It was shaking a little.

“Thank you, Tara,” Buffy said, and hugged her.

The hug took Tara by surprise, but as Buffy held her, Tara felt herself relaxing. And she hugged Buffy back.

“Thank you,” Buffy said again, whispering it in Tara’s ear.

When Tara looked at Buffy again, a tear was running down Buffy’s cheek.

“You’re welcome,” Tara said.

Buffy kissed her cheek, and walked to the door.

“I’ll protect her,” Angel said to Faith.

“I know, Angel,” Faith said. “I trust you.”

Buffy watched Angel. He looked calm, centered...serene. He always did. When she was with him, she always thought nothing could touch her...when she was with him, she always knew she could save the world. She always knew there would be a happy ending. But today, she wasn’t so sure.

She suddenly felt panic moving through her. It was like a living thing, it was like an animal stalking her; there was intent behind its movements. It started in her legs: Buffy felt it slithering around her ankles, and making its way up her thighs like a snake. Her legs felt shaky. She thought she was going to fall. Then panic leaped up into her stomach, and separated; it became hundreds, thousands, of creeping, crawling things: she felt like bugs were burrowing around in her stomach. She felt nauseous. She wanted to vomit. But then the bugs changed, coalesced into one thing again, became a wolf: the wolf leaped into her throat, clawing at it, cutting off her air, trying to suffocate her...

Buffy wanted Angel to take her in his arms and tell her he’d make everything okay, like he always had before...she wanted to go to him...

She didn’t.

She dismissed the snake, and the bugs, and the wolf, and took Faith’s hand. It was warm. It was strong.

“Good luck,” Angel said.

“You too,” Buffy said, and followed Faith out the door.

“Change of plans, gents,” Spike said.

Buffy was right; he didn’t want the world to end. All the Big Bads were always spouting off about their grand plans to end the world. But what was so bloody wrong with the world? There were women and football games and beer and music and poetry slams and people to eat. It was a great old world. And besides, if you slaughter the human race, what’s left to eat after that?

“The asking price was three-hundred thousand,” Spike said. “Now it’s a million. Overhead. You know how it is.”

“We had a deal,” The Priest of Swords said.

“Had’s the word, innit?” Spike said. “We’re all evil here, we all know these things happen. If you need more time to get the money together I can meet you back here tonight or tomorrow.”

“That won’t be necessary,” the Priest of Wands said. And smiled.

And the four vampires leaped at Spike, slavering and snarling...

Angel’s GTX blazed down the deserted road, as the sun fell from the sky ahead of them, collapsing into orange fire. The wind howled, and the road was a gray blur behind them, and the dense trees to either side were a flash of green, streaking by and melting away around them. Buffy felt like she barely had control of the car. It was moving so fast it seemed like she was riding a rocket that could shoot out from underneath her at any second and just continue on its way without her. She was thankful there weren’t any sharp curves on the way to the cemetery. She looked at the speedometer. The car was doing 130 miles an hour.

She almost smiled. It would be funny if the Slayer died in a car accident on her way to save the world...

Her mind wandered, and dwelt on silly things. She wondered what would happen if they ran into a sudden traffic jam. Or if the car attracted the police and the police chased them to the cemetery...

Then her mind came back to Faith, like it always did eventually.

Faith was looking straight ahead at the road. She sat up perfectly straight; her body was rigid. She hadn’t said a word.

“Whatcha thinkin’ about, baby?” Buffy said.

“Becca,” Faith said.

The vampires clawed at Spike like animals, snapping and growling, trying to get the Key.

As Spike dodged, he could see the four priests standing in the shadows, their eyes closed, their hands clasped in prayer.

“We beseech the First. The one True God. Lightbringer, illuminate the path,” the Priest of Cups said.

“We beseech the First. The one True God. Lightbringer, lead us to glory,” the Priest of Swords said.

Spike kicked a vampire in the face, and stole a quick glance at the open crypt door behind him. The sun was nearly at the horizon.

“How much longer?” Faith said.

“Any second now,” Buffy said. “Faith...about Tara?”

“Yeah?”

“I think...I think she’s in love with you.”

“Yeah. I know. She is.”

Buffy looked over at her. Faith was still looking straight ahead at the road.

“Do you...do you...love Tara?” Buffy said.

“Yeah,” Faith said.

Then she took Buffy’s hand.

“But you’re my girl, Buffy,” Faith said.

Buffy smiled, and nodded.

They looked at the sun. It would be gone in minutes. And then night would come...and maybe never leave...

“Figure we’re gonna die?” Faith said.

“Are we gonna make it, Xander?” Willow said.

They sat on the couch together. She ate Oreos with double stuff, and drank her super mocha cappuccino. He was drinking tea now.

They didn’t sit very close to each other. They didn’t hold hands.

“I don’t know,” Xander said. “I love you. But...what happened to you...I can’t...I don’t know if I can deal with it, Willow. I don’t know if I can deal with worrying about you...worrying about someone making you a victim again.”

She looked at him, her green eyes flashing.

“I’m not a victim,” she said. “I’m no one’s fucking victim. Get it through your head. And don’t ever use that fucking word to describe me again.”

Willow was showing Xander her teeth.

“Uh...sorry,” Xander said.

She looked away from him. They were quiet.

“Where did you just go?” Xander said.

“You throwin’ me brainteasers now, dude?” Willow said. “The hell are you talkin’ about?”

“Sometimes...like right now? You...go away. You start acting like...like you’re not you. You start acting...different. Talking different.”

“Yeah...well...um...I guess this whole thing has me...kinda stressed, okay?” she said, and looked down at her knees, and began fidgeting with her hair, twisting it into little loops. “I mean, y’know, my boyfriend’s all like, hey, here’s an idea, how about you stop doing what you love to do for like, the rest of your life. I’m just...I’m not having a good day, okay? And you didn’t answer my question. Are we gonna make it?”

“Not sure I have an answer.”

“That closet happened to me, not you. I’m dealing with it. Why can’t you...trust me to deal with it?”

“How about, because you’re not dealing with it?”

“What do you want me to do, Xander? Should I talk about it all the time? Should I like, hold up a sign saying I was mentally raped by a vampire? You want me to get it tattooed on my arm? Should I find a support group? This thing happened to me and you’re making it all about you. You say I’m not over it but what you really mean is you want me to be all, all like...some panicky victim girl so you can be all macho and act like you’re protecting me. Because you couldn’t protect me before. And you can’t deal with it now. You’re the one who’s not past this. Yeah, okay, I have rough days with it sometimes? But I’m not letting it eat up my whole life. You’re the one who wants to let this thing change us, not me.”

“I just wanna protect you, Willow.”

“Well you can’t,” Willow said, and looked Xander in the eyes. “Okay? You can’t.”

Xander’s face became red. He looked away from her eyes.

“I don’t think we’re gonna make it,” he said, softy.

Willow nodded.

“Guess not,” she said, and tears rolled down her cheeks.

She wiped them away.

They were quiet after that. There really wasn’t anything else to say.

They stayed on the couch together, because neither of them wanted to walk away...

“Do either of you know what’s wrong with the blasted phone?” Giles said, striding into the room. When Giles started striding it always meant he was angry at technology.

“Um...what’s it doing?” Willow said.

“I can’t dial out,” Giles said. “I pick it up and there’s no dial tone.”

“Did you disconnect it somehow?” Willow said, getting up.

“No, it’s still connected to the phone jack in the wall. It was working perfectly yesterday.”

Willow walked away from Xander, and Giles followed her into the study. She crouched down and looked underneath the desk, picking up the phone wire and checking its connection. Then she stood up and picked up the phone, and started pressing buttons.

“Okay, this is...weird,” Willow said. “There’s no dial tone but it’s plugged into the jack. It was fine when I called Buffy’s house.”

“Blasted thing,” Giles muttered.

“Maybe...the phone jack went kablooie?” Willow said, thinking about it.

“‘Kablooie’?”

“It’s a technical term, a layman like you wouldn’t get it.”

Giles put his hand on her shoulder.

“How are you two doing?” he said.

“He...he, um...he...left me,” Willow whispered.

“I’m sorry, Willow,” Giles said.

“Yeah...I’m...dealing with it, okay?” Willow said. “I’ll be...I’ll be okay.”

Giles took her hand, and looked down into her eyes...

“I can...I can be strong,” Willow said, as her lips began to tremble. “All this stuff? I’m...I’m a big girl, I can deal. I can deal.”

“I know,” Giles said. “You’re one of the strongest people I’ve ever met.”

“That stuff? The stuff Angelus did to me? I’m over it,” she said, as tears came into her eyes. “I’m over it.”

Giles hugged her.

“He left me, Giles,” Willow whispered, and broke down in tears.

“Oh, sod off!” Spike shouted. The vampires had him on the floor, and he rolled around, trying to cover up as they slashed and bit at him. “Get the fuck off me, you bleedin’...! Fuck!” They clawed at him, searching for the Key...

He wondered how he had gotten into this situation. Instead of making three-hundred thousand dollars he was now apparently trying to save the world. Because a Slayer had asked him to.

He checked to make sure he was still evil. He was.

Then what the hell was he doing?

Life certainly threw you a curveball every now and again...

“Bugger this!” he shouted, and kicked all four vampires off him, sending them flying, his face changing to vampire form as he did. He leaped up, and roared at everyone in the crypt.

He looked down at his leather coat. It had a slash running through it.

“I really like this coat! This coat’s SPECIAL!” he screamed, and punched one of the vampires out of the air as it ran back and leaped at him. The vampire went flying across the crypt and smashed into the far wall. Spike glanced outside. There were only minutes left until sunset. As the vampires came at him again, Spike saw the four priests in a shadowy corner, looking positively blissful.

“We beseech the First. The one True God. Lightbringer, give us the power,” the Priest of Pentacles said.

“We beseech the First. The one True God. Lightbringer, open the gate,” the Priest of Wands said.

“Beseech my arse!” Spike snarled, and flipped one vampire over his head as it sprang at him, then spun and kicked another that was trying to tackle him from behind. He didn’t have a stake and the crypt was too small; if he was going to survive this fight he needed a weapon and he needed room to move.

“After I save the world I swear I’m gonna kill that girl,” he muttered, and ran out of the crypt into the waning daylight of the cemetery.

Spike’s skin smoked a little, but the sun was almost gone, and there was no direct light. Under the abundant shadows of the trees, it was only a minor irritation. Very minor, he thought, compared to the fact that he was apparently doing Buffy Summers’ bidding, for bollocks only knew what reason. He tore a good, sturdy branch from a tree. Now he had a weapon.

The vampires followed him out of the crypt, which he expected. He turned and faced them. All he had to do was keep the Key out of their hands for, at best, five minutes, and then everything would be fine, and he could go home and have a beer and watch Passions and think of ways to kill Buffy.

Unfortunately, at least thirty vampires came streaming out of the three crypts behind him, which is something he hadn’t expected...

“I don’t believe my life sometimes,” Spike muttered, and punched the closest one in the face, and ran...

“It would be the biggest cemetery in the world,” Buffy said, as she tore through the cemetery in the GTX, frantically swerving to avoid the tombstones that barred her way like traffic cones on a Drivers Ed course.

“There,” Faith said, pointing out a car parked under a stand of trees on the far side of the cemetery. It was a black Desoto, with blacked-out windows. As they drove toward it, Buffy and Faith could hear what sounded like one hell of a big fight going on somewhere...

“How much time now?” Tara said.

“Maybe five minutes,” Angel said.

They sat on the couch together. Tara had stopped drinking because she realized that if her life was about to end, she wanted to be able to at least think straight. To reflect on it.

She found herself thinking about Faith.

They hadn’t been given much time together. And in the end, she had lost her...but Tara was grateful for her anyway.

“Do you...have any regrets?” Tara said. “Okay, corny question? But...we might be about to die here.”

“I’ve got about a million regrets,” Angel said. “Number one on the list right now is that I didn’t hand Spike his ass when I had the chance. How about you? You have any regrets?”

Tara touched the crystal pendant she wore. It felt warm between her fingers, like it always did...

And she remembered something. Something she had forgotten, until this moment...

You’re my special girl, she remembered the witch saying to her when she was just nine years old, looking down at her with piercing green eyes and smiling her beautiful, slightly goofy smile underneath a big, bright, sun and a crystal clear blue sky that went on for a million miles in every direction, like she was the reason it was all there...like she was the pillar holding up the world...

You’re my little goddess, the witch said.

“No,” Tara said, and smiled. “No regrets.”

“Fuck!” Spike shouted, staking a vampire with his tree branch and running again. There were too many of them, and there were even more streaming out of the crypts now...

“There are even more where they came from, I’m afraid,” the Priest of Wands called out. He was standing in front of the crypt Spike had run out of, and looking at the setting sun. “The crypts in this cemetery are all connected by tunnels, and I have quite a lot of vampires. Why don’t you just give us the Key now. We’ll even let you keep the money.” He smiled. And the three priests standing behind him smiled, too. Even the Priest of Swords, whom Spike was certain hadn’t been laid in forty years.

The vampires had Spike completely surrounded now. There were dozens of them, with more coming. But they weren’t attacking; they were giving him one last chance to surrender.

“Go climb an altar boy,” Spike said. And smirked.

The priests stopped smiling then. Although Spike thought he heard the Priest of Pentacles chuckle.

The vampires closed in on him.

“Bollocks!” Spike shouted, and decided to just pick a direction and try to barrel through. It wasn’t a bad plan, as far as it went, he thought, as he headed in the direction his car was parked. It was more thought-out than most of his plans...

“Bollocks!” Buffy and Faith heard someone shout.

When they made it to the other side of the Desoto, they saw Spike in the distance trying to fight off at least fifty vampires.

“Look--you see them? They’re all trying to tackle Spike,” Buffy said.

“Means he must still have the Key,” Faith said.

“Plan?”

“Smash and grab. Put the top down. We’ll plow through these vamps with the car, have Spike throw the Key to us and drive right the hell out of here. We don’t get bogged down, we don’t let the vamps swarm the car. In and out.”

Buffy nodded, put the top down, and drove straight toward Spike.

“Faith? I love you, baby. I love you,” Buffy said.

Faith kissed her.

“I love you too,” Faith said. “You’re my girl. You’re my girl forever.”

The plan wasn’t working. Spike was forced to consider that perhaps it wasn’t very well thought-out after all. He had run straight at the eight vampires to his right and had nearly, but not quite, broken through. And now he was punching and kicking and cursing and waving his tree branch around, and feeling like an idiot. Not because the plan hadn’t worked--his plans never really did, he wasn’t much of a plan person, that was always Angelus’ department--but because he was going to die here trying to do a favor for Buffy Summers, who wasn’t just a Slayer, but was in point of fact the most annoying girl he had ever met in his more than a century of unlife. The vampires slashed at him, trying to get to the Key he held in his left hand. There were too many of them...he knew they’d drag him down within seconds...

He heard a car.

And then he saw Buffy and Faith smash into the vampires with the blackest, shiniest, fastest, meanest car he had ever laid eyes on. The car--a classic 1967 Plymouth GTX convertible which Spike was absolutely certain had to be Angel’s--tore through the vampires like a bomb going off, sending them flying through the air...

“Spike! Throw us the Key!” Buffy shouted, wrestling with the car, trying to keep it straight and trying to keep her speed up, as Faith tried her best to keep the vampires they were running over from ending up in the car beside them, catching them as they flew up over the hood and using their momentum to toss them away.

Buffy and Faith knew they only had one shot at this...and if they missed...

“What, and then you’re just gonna leave me here?!” Spike shouted back, as he ran and dodged and swung his tree branch around like a chicken with its head cut off. The vampires had him surrounded, but they were confused now; some of them were running after the car, and some were trying to get out of its way, and the rest were still chasing him. But there were less of them chasing him now than before, at least...

“I’m gonna kill him,” Faith muttered, as she held on as best she could. The car was like riding a bull now; every vampire they ran into knocked them off course a little more and Buffy was just barely able to keep the car straight.

“Just fucking DO IT!” Buffy screamed. “Throw us the Key NOW or THE WORLD’S GONNA END!”

They were passing close to him now...this was their chance...their only chance, they knew.

“Oh, FINE!” Spike shouted. “But you OWE me for this!”

He dived to the ground as three vampires sprang at him, rolled back up to his feet, saw the car as it passed, and managed to throw the Key in the direction of the car just before four more vampires tackled him from behind...

And then he winced, as a vampire leaped up into the air and intercepted it.

“Oh...fuck!” Spike screamed, as the vampires pounded on his back and slashed at him with their claws, howling like wolves. “Fuck, fuck, FUCK!”

“PLAN B!” Faith screamed, and grabbed the duffel bag from the back seat as Buffy slammed on the brakes and wrenched the car to a spinning stop, taking out a few more vampires as she did. Buffy leaped out of the car with Faith, and they both drew their swords...

“Where is it?!” Buffy screamed, as the vampires, dozens of them, regrouped and came at them. “WHICH ONE HAS IT?!”

“You’re faster than me! I’ll hold ’em off, you find the Key! GO!” Faith shouted, and pulled bottles of holy water from the duffel bag and threw them at the vampires as Buffy started sprinting. The vampires shrieked and screamed and burst into flames as the holy water hit them, and Faith started running in the opposite direction from the way Buffy had gone, trying to draw the vampires after her. She knew holy water hurt like a bastard to a vampire and she was hoping they’d stay good and angry at her...

They did. The vampires chased her, howling like wolves and screaming as Faith ducked and dodged and ran and leaped like a jackrabbit, lobbing the last of her holy water bottles at them as she did...

“Spike!” Buffy screamed. “Where are you? Where’s the Key?!”

Spike kicked and punched and slashed out with his claws, trying to get back up to his feet, trying to get the vampires off him...

It worked. The vampires simply got up and ran away from him.

Spike stood up and dusted himself off. The vampires were ignoring him, he realized; they were focusing on Buffy and the other girl she’d brought with her. He looked around and did a quick count. He counted at least one-hundred and twenty vampires now. He saw Faith just barely keeping ahead of a horde of the vampires, occasionally stopping to stake one or behead one with her sword when it got a little ahead of the pack, but then immediately sprinting away before the rest could catch her, never allowing herself to be pinned down. He saw Buffy, looking around wildly, trying to locate the Key and trying to keep herself alive at the same time; nearly all of the vampires were focused on Faith but there were still at least two dozen running after Buffy. She easily kept ahead of them, but she stayed close to the crypts, looking for the Key...

“Right here, Slayer,” Spike called out. “And by the way? You and your girlfriend are well and truly buggered, I’d say.”

“Spike!” Buffy shouted. “Where’s the Key? Help me find it! PLEASE!”

“How the bloody hell should I know where it is?” Spike shouted, throwing up his hands in exasperation as Buffy slashed her wakizashi back and forth, beheading vampires as they sprang at her from all sides, and trying to keep ahead of them. The vampires were ignoring Spike completely now. “I’m evil, remember? You’re the bloody Slayer, not me!”

Spike noticed a small group of the vampires, about a dozen or so, making their way back to the priests. About thirty vampires had formed a line in front of the priests, and the vampires heading back to the priests were using their brethren as a screen. Spike knew they must have the Key...the ones attacking Buffy and the other girl, who was obviously a Slayer herself, were just keeping them busy...

Spike had to smile. It was a clever tactic...

“SPIKE!” Buffy screamed, as she slashed her wakizashi around, dodging the vampires as best she could...

Spike knew he had to make a decision. If he tried to get past the thirty or so vampires who were forming a line in front of the priests, he might pull it off...he might actually manage to reach the priests with his skin still attached, if Buffy came with him and ran interference. But even if he did reach them, the sun was about to set; he knew they couldn’t have much more than a couple of minutes left now. And getting the Key back might save the world but it wouldn’t destroy all those vampires, and Spike had a feeling they’d be pretty peeved at him if he canceled their little apocalypse. Angry enough to kill him. Spike liked a good scrap but three against more than a hundred wasn’t a scrap, it was suicide.

He made a decision.

“Sorry pet,” he said. “You were right, I do like the world. So I’d fancy being able to live in it for awhile longer.”

And he walked away.

“Spike!” Buffy screamed, as the vampires surrounded her. “Spike!”

“Nice knowing you, Slayer,” Spike said, and waved, as he walked back toward his car. For a moment he considered trying to steal Angel’s car but he would have to get past that other Slayer to get near it and he had a feeling she might kill him.

“SPIKE!” Buffy screamed.

Spike stopped. There was something different in her voice, now...she wasn’t pleading anymore. There was no trace of panic left in her tone, now...there was something else.

He turned.

Buffy was surrounded. At least twenty-five vampires had her pinned down. She had her sword in one hand, and her stake in the other, and she stood in the center of the circle of predators, a lion at bay.

There was a light in Buffy’s eyes, as bright and hard as diamonds, that Spike had never seen before.

Buffy showed Spike her teeth.

“We’re gonna see each other again,” Buffy said, in a voice that was pure steel. “And when we do you’re going to die.”

The look in Buffy’s eyes was something Spike had never seen before...in anyone, in all his years.

“It’s a date,” he said, and smirked...and turned around, and walked away.

Tara sat with Angel on the couch, and held his hand tight. She was afraid: he could hear her heart pounding in her chest, too fast. He could see how pale her face was, he could feel her hand shaking in his. And he could smell it on her, too. There was a time when he loved the way fear smelled on a person. But not now, and not with Tara. Her fear changed her beautiful ginger scent; made it harsh.

“No matter what happens, I’ll protect you, Tara,” Angel said.

“Thanks,” Tara said, and managed a small smile. “How much time now?”

“Oh, it won’t be long now,” Darla said, suddenly sitting in one of the chairs across from them.

Tara gasped.

“Who...who...?” Tara whispered.

“She’s the First,” Angel said. “But don’t worry. She can’t touch us. All she can do is make speeches. Boring ones.”

“I’m Darla, my dear,” Darla said. “I’m the woman who made the beautiful darling boy sitting beside you. Well...I’m the image of her. In all the important ways, all the ways that matter, I’m her. I have Darla’s memories, her feelings. And her impeccable sense of style,” she added, with a beautiful, wolfish smile. “Angel darling, aren’t you going to introduce me to your new friend? I know I didn’t raise you to be rude.”

“I’m...T-Tara,” Tara said.

“A new recruit for your plucky little band of adventurers?” Darla said. “How precious! But unfortunately you’ve come in at the end of the story, Tara. All you can do now is die with them.”

Buffy looked around. She relaxed. She focused on her senses. She knew she had maybe two minutes left, maybe less. She couldn’t see the sun; it was just about gone. The little clearing she was standing in was becoming dark, and cold.

The twenty-five vampires around her weren’t attacking her. They were hemming her in...trying to keep her there. They were protecting the Key, Buffy realized...

She could just barely see a throng of vampires standing in front of one of the crypts...

And she knew where the Key was. She knew the priests already had it.

“FAITH!” Buffy screamed. “The priests! They’re the ones who have to do the ceremony!”

Buffy had no idea where Faith was. She had no idea if she was even alive.

She picked a direction and ran, trying to break through the circle. The vampires converged on her, springing at her like wolves, but she was too fast: she spun and ducked and dodged, slashing out with her wakizashi, beheading two of them and staking a third and just managing to squeeze out of the circle. She was sprinting toward the mass of vampires blocking the crypt now...

She heard a car.

And then she was suddenly flying through the air, as Angel’s GTX streaked by and Faith grabbed Buffy’s arm and pulled her inside. Buffy landed in Faith’s lap in the front seat.

“Hey, beautiful,” Faith said, as she drove around in circles, trying to pick up some speed without letting the vampires swarm the car. “My girl okay?”

“Now that you’re here,” Buffy said, and sat up. “You?”

Faith had a slash on her arm, and her clothes were torn.

“Some guys are just grabby, y’know?” Faith said. “Bottom of the ninth, honey. Two on, two out. We gotta kill those priests before they can do whatever magic shit they’re gonna do.”

“Yeah,” Buffy said. She looked over at the mass of vampires in front of the crypt. They were bracing themselves. Buffy couldn’t see the priests behind them but she knew they were there; she smelled them. Their scents were easy to pick out; they were the only ones that didn’t smell like rotten meat.

Okay, and the second thing is, weapons, Buffy remembered Xander saying. Our stockpile is low; other than our swords we’re down to the two flamethrowers, and I think I might have one grenade somewhere...

If she had a grenade now Buffy knew she could simply lob it over the vampire’s heads and take out all four of the priests at once without having to get through the vampires at all...it would work, and it would save them...it would save the world...

But she didn’t have a grenade.

Because Xander was gone...she had lost him.

“Here’s the plan,” Faith said. “I figure we have maybe like a minute or so left here. No way that’s enough time to get through all those vamps even with the car. So we’re going over them.”

“Over?” Buffy said. “How?”

“I’m gonna get this car going as fast as I can and then I’m ramming it straight into the vamps,” Faith said, as she checked the rearview mirror and kept driving in circles, trying to keep the car from being swarmed. Buffy handled any vampires who got too close, slashing out with her wakizashi. “Just before I do, I want you standing up in your seat, ready to jump. When the car hits the vamps we’ll be thrown forward hard, like in a car crash. I want you to jump as far out as you can and as high as you can the second the car hits ’em. We got the top down, with the car’s momentum and those sexy Slayer leg muscles I’m betting you can jump clean over all those vamps and take a shot at the priests.”

“I think Burt Reynolds came up with this exact plan in one of his car movies,” Buffy said.

“Probably,” Faith said. “But it’s all we’ve got. If we can just get you near those priests with your sword we have a chance. Not a great chance, but a chance. You ready?”

“Yeah,” Buffy said.

Faith took a wide turn, pointed the car back at the crypt and floored it. The vampires chasing them tried to catch up, sprinting along after the car on either side, but they weren’t fast enough...

“I love you,” Faith said, and took Buffy’s hand, and kissed it. “You’re my girl.”

“I love you too, baby,” Buffy said, and got up on top of the seat in a crouch...

The car streaked straight toward the vampires in front of the crypt.

Faith ducked her head and held her arms up in front of her, preparing to be thrown through the windshield by the collision, as Buffy prepared to jump...

Tara couldn’t look at Darla’s eyes. She looked away. She moved closer to Angel.

“Don’t listen to her, Tara,” Angel said. “She lies. She tries to screw with your head. Don’t listen.”

“I don’t always lie,” Darla said. “If you stay with these people, you’ll be killed, Tara. I promise you that. And it will be a painful death. But if you leave, now? If you get in your car and drive away, and never look back? You’ll live. I can promise you that, too. I can see to it you’re protected. My voice is whispering in the ear of every vampire in the world right now. They’re ready to rise up and choke the life from this world, the moment I give the word. If you leave now, I’ll make sure they don’t hurt you. You look like an intelligent girl. Use your head. I’m offering you a way out.”

Buffy jumped as high as she could when the car smashed into the line of vampires, and she heard Faith scream and smash through the windshield somewhere behind her as she sailed through the air, clear above the heads of the vampires. But she was too high; the car had provided so much momentum that she was in danger of clearing the crypt itself. Buffy aimed herself down in a dive, pointed at the last row of vampires guarding the crypt entrance...

She crash-landed on top of the last row of vampires, taking four of them down with her. She didn’t know exactly where the priests were, she couldn’t see them and all she could hear was the vampires growling and shrieking, but she knew the priests were close; she smelled them. She got to her feet and started slashing out wildly with her sword and stabbing the air with her stake; she knew Faith wasn’t nearby so anything that moved was a target. She knew her only hope was to hit the vampires hard and fast and find the priests before the vampires could bring her down...

She tried to focus on her nose. It was difficult; she was in the middle of a mass of shrieking vampires and their scent was strong. She slashed her wakizashi through the air so fast it became a blur, not even looking at what she was hitting with it, just trying to clear some space so she could move. She had one advantage: there were so many vampires that they were all getting in each other’s way. There were more than a hundred vampires there but most of them had no way to reach her. Every time she cut one down another immediately took its place, but they couldn’t effectively use their numbers against her.

Faintly, she heard Faith; she was about twenty yards away to her right. But Buffy still wasn’t able to get a bead on the priests...

“Stop her!” she heard. “Stop her! Kill her!”

Buffy smiled. Every bad guy she’d ever come up against had the same weakness: they talked too much. If the priest had just kept his mouth shut she might not have found him in time. Now she was able to move in the direction of the voice, cutting her way toward it...

A bright spurt of red erupted like a geyser in front of her, and she realized she had just killed one of the priests without even realizing he was in front of her.

She had never killed a human being before.

She thought she should feel something. Guilt, shame, something. But she didn’t feel anything, or at least she didn’t have time to right then, so she kept on slashing the air with her sword, and stabbing out with her stake, spinning around as she moved relentlessly forward, doing her best to clear the space on her flanks and not let any of the vampires tackle her from behind either...

Pieces of the vampires were flying through the air all around her as she hacked her way through them: arms and legs and fingers. Her sword penetrated something hard, like a shovel striking stone as it digs through the dirt, and Buffy saw that she had embedded her sword in a vampire’s ribs. It was stuck there; she had to kick the vampire away and pull at the same time to dislodge it. As she did her elbow jerked backwards and she heard someone moan; she turned and saw that she had elbowed one of the priests in the jaw, and he was unconscious on the ground. She stabbed him through the heart with her sword and kept moving forward, slashing it around her in a wide arc. The vampires’ blood was raining down on her now as she slashed and hacked and stabbed them. It was like walking through a fountain.

“Hold her off! Hold her off!” Buffy heard another priest shrieking, to her left. She ran toward the voice, and felt her sword cleave one vampire’s head right down the middle and felt her stake penetrate a vampire’s cheekbone as he leaped at her and she ducked him. She got a glimpse of the remaining two priests; they were standing close together with six vampires who weren’t leaving their side. They would be tricky...

Suddenly Buffy saw Faith leap at all six vampires, roaring like a lion ambushing its prey. Faith tackled them, managing to bring four of them to the ground, and Buffy saw her opening. She spun away from one vampire who tried to grab her, ducked under another’s slashing claws and staked him, dropped into a crouch and cut the legs out from under a third as it sprang at her, and ran for Faith and the priests. Faith was rolling around under a pile of vampires, stabbing with her sword and her stake and cutting them to ribbons. The two priests saw Buffy and started running. With a roar, Buffy sprang over a vampire who tried to tackle her at the knees and stabbed at the nearer of the two priests with her sword: the sword went straight through the back of the priest’s head and out the other side and got stuck there. Buffy had to wrench it back out; as she did it flayed the priest’s head like a watermelon, reducing it to bloody chunks.

When Buffy looked up again, she saw the last priest...the one with the golden sword pendant around his neck...

He had the Key.

“So what say you?” Darla said. “Will you leave, and enjoy my generous protection? Or stay and die bloody?” Darla licked her lips.

Tara looked at Darla. She met her eyes and didn’t flinch.

“Screw you,” Tara said. “Faith’s so gonna ki-kick your ass.”

Darla laughed. “Why, I’m positively quaking at the prospect, Tara dear,” Darla said. “Angel, be a pet and open the curtains. Let’s see the show.”

Buffy sensed it: she knew the sun was setting, right now. She knew she was down to seconds. The old priest was running from her, running flat out. Vampires were converging on him from all sides, trying to shield him...

Buffy knew she’d never reach him in time.

She hefted her sword like a javelin, and threw it with all her strength...

As the sword sped unerringly to its target, the priest raised the Key to the heavens, and closed his eyes...

“AMEN!” the priest screamed, one second before the sword sliced through his back and impaled him through the heart, and he fell over, dead...

And the sun set.

And then the bodies of all four priests were suddenly vaporized in eruptions of ghastly green light that exploded out of them, shaking the cemetery like an earthquake had hit it, throwing Buffy and Faith and all the vampires to the ground...

The four beams of light joined, combined into one, stabbed straight up into the sky and tore a hole in it. When Buffy looked up, she saw a blackness, flooding in through that rip in the sky like some giant insect swarm, blotting out the setting sun and turning day into night like a solar eclipse...

The green light faded away, and night covered the world.

Angel and Tara looked out the window, aghast. Where a moment before it had been day, now it was black night. There was no twilight, no gradual darkening of the sky; the sun had set seconds before, but now night covered the world like a funeral shroud.

Angel smelled vampires, scores of them. Faintly, he heard screams, echoing through the streets.

“Lovely, isn’t it?” Darla said, standing behind them.

“Goddess,” Tara whispered. “Goddess save us.”

“She’s abandoned you,” Darla said. “She finally grew tired of you monkeys, and left this world to me. Why do you think the Horsemen were allowed to arrive? Nothing can be done out of Her hand.”

“The Horsemen?” Angel said, and looked hard at Darla...looked down into the nothingness in her blue eyes. “They’re here now? They’ve been released?”

“Oh, yes, my angel,” Darla said, and smiled, as Tara began to cry. “And not only the Horsemen. My army is marching, everywhere. I’ve just given the word, whispered it in the ears of every vampire in the world...go forth in my name. Raze this world to the ground. Kill everything.”

Darla moved closer to Angel, and put her mouth to his ear.

“You should’ve taken the deal, my love,” she whispered, and disappeared.

The earth shook. Buffy covered her ears, trying in vain to block out the terrible, deafening roar as the earth thundered all around her. She tried to stand, but every time she managed to get back up, she was thrown to the ground again. When she looked around her, trying to peer through the near total blackness that had been daylight a moment before, the world seemed to distort, to melt, in front of her eyes. The ground no longer seemed solid; it undulated, flowed away in waves, leaped up to meet the sky. Buffy was thrown around like a leaf in a tornado. She closed her eyes and covered up as best she could; when she peeked out, she couldn’t tell where the ground stopped and the sky started anymore...she felt like she was drowning in the dark...

“Buffy!” she thought she heard Faith shout, but she couldn’t see her...

It was as if this dark wasn’t just a quality of light but a physical thing in and of itself...something cold and black and thick and a million miles wide and a million more deep and it would creep into your lungs and drag you down...

Eventually, the tremors grew less. The earth thundered, but Buffy wasn’t being bounced around the cemetery like a pinball anymore. The tremors were still too strong for her to stand up, but she was able to get her bearings. She heard the vampires; they couldn’t stand up either, but they were howling and laughing... celebrating. They weren’t attacking her. They weren’t bothering anymore.

“Faith!” Buffy shouted. “Baby? Where are you, baby?!”

“Buffy!” Faith shouted again. Buffy could barely hear her voice over the roaring all around her...

Buffy looked around again, and could just make Faith out; she was on her knees on the ground by a marble statue of an angel, hugging it, using it as an anchor. Buffy tried to get up, and fell again as the earth continued heaving around her. So she crawled to Faith instead, making her way to her as fast as she could.

“Faith! I’m coming, baby!” Buffy shouted. “I’m coming!”

Buffy realized she was crying. She didn’t know when she had started crying.

After what seemed like hours, she finally reached Faith.

“Buffy!” Faith screamed, with tears running down her cheeks. She let go of the angel, and leaped at Buffy, and threw her arms around her. “It’s over! We...we lost!”

Buffy hugged her, and held on tight to her.

“I love you, I love you!” Buffy screamed. “ I love you, baby!”

Faith was shrieking and wailing now. Buffy held her to her breasts, and rocked her, and kissed her hair.

“It’s okay,” Buffy said, in her ear. “It’s okay, baby, it’s okay...I’m here now, baby. I’m here. I’m here...”

Eventually, the world stopped shaking, and the roaring went away. Buffy and Faith held each other, as the angel stood vigilant above them, her beautiful wings outstretched, her sword held high, her keen eyes watching over them. The cemetery became still, and silent.

But the darkness remained...Buffy felt it, on her skin. It was a sleek, cold thing and wherever it touched her she shuddered, and a feeling came over her...

She felt like all the warmth had gone out of the world.

“I’m cold,” Faith whispered. “I’m cold, Buffy.”

“I’m gonna keep you warm, baby,” Buffy whispered back, and kissed her, and held her tight...

And then Buffy felt something else. The earth was vibrating beneath her now. And she heard something...it sounded like cannon fire...

“The sky!” Willow screamed, and ran into the living room, to the nearest window. “What happened to the sky?!” She threw the window open and leaned out, looking up at the black night...

With a snarl, a vampire grabbed her and tried to pull her out the window.

“WILLOW!” Xander shouted, running in from the kitchen as Giles came in from the study. Giles managed to grab onto Willow’s right arm and Xander was able to grab her around the waist as they desperately tried to pull her from the vampire’s grasp. It was one of the wolf vampires; it growled and slavered and snapped its teeth at them like an animal as it tried to pull Willow away. The vampire couldn’t enter the house, couldn’t actually break the plane of the window, but he had a good grip on Willow’s left arm now, and Xander and Giles together were only just strong enough to keep him from taking Willow outright; they weren’t strong enough to pull her back in...

Willow was screaming. The vampire’s claws had torn through her sleeve, and dug deep into her flesh, and drawn blood...

Giles punched the vampire in the face. It growled and bit at him, but it didn’t move away from the window, or release its grip on Willow.

“NO!” Willow shrieked. “NO NO NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!”

Willow eyes turned black...

The vampire punched Willow in the face, and knocked her unconscious.

Xander was pulling with all his might. He knew he was going to lose her...

“Giles, hold her!” Xander screamed, and ran out of the room...

The cannon fire was getting closer, and louder. The earth was still vibrating. But the earthquake had stopped; Buffy thought she could stand now.

Buffy rocked Faith in her arms, and kissed her, as she trembled, and cried.

“Baby?” Buffy whispered. “Baby we...we gotta get up, okay? We gotta get up now.”

Faith nodded, and let Buffy stand her up. Buffy didn’t let go of her. She held onto Faith, as tight as she could, so the darkness couldn’t snatch her away.

The cannon fire was almost upon them.

“What...what’s that noise?” Faith whispered.

They could barely see in that dark. The vampires were there, standing away from them and staring in the direction of the noise, and making no move to attack them...the vampires were still howling and laughing...

“It’s...it’s...” Buffy said, letting her senses reach out...

She felt something, in her heart...like a knife had just stabbed into it, and twisted.

“It’s hoofbeats,” Buffy whispered.

Buffy and Faith peered out into the darkness...

And they saw a deeper darkness emerge from it...

And they saw a Horseman.

The Horseman galloped straight at them, a skeleton in a black, hooded robe, riding a great black horse, and holding aloft a giant black scythe. The horse was dead; its eyes were two empty sockets. But the earth thundered beneath its hooves...

The Horseman borne upon that great and terrible steed had eyes that burned like stars.

Terror seized Buffy and Faith like some bird of prey swooping down out of the darkness and carrying them off in its talons, when they saw those eyes; they felt an icy wind whipping around them, stealing their breath away, stealing their warmth away, freezing their blood...

They screamed. Their screams welled up inside them from a secret place deep down that they hadn’t even known was there, and exploded out of them; but they weren’t merely screams of terror. They were screams of revulsion too, and outrage: this Horseman didn’t belong in the world. Buffy and Faith knew that he had stabbed his way in from some nightmare place, a place human beings weren’t ever meant to see...Buffy and Faith knew, instinctively, that this Horseman was a perversion, a black stain...a sword through the world’s heart. They knew the world couldn’t abide his coming; he was a burden the world wasn’t meant to bear.

They knew the world would collapse under it.

The Horseman smelled like a dead thing. His scent touched something inside Buffy and Faith...they screamed again, and this time their screams carried only terror, distilled down to its black essence.

Because they knew now that this Horseman was Death...

The Horseman checked his horse, and looked straight at them.

“I see you,” he said. His voice was like an echo from the grave.

Buffy and Faith stood there, trembling.

Two more Horsemen suddenly appeared out of the darkness behind the first; they looked like the first rider, skeletons in black, hooded robes, but their horses were different. One rode a horse colored a sickly yellow, and the other rode a thin, bony horse colored a dull, ashen gray. The rider on the sickly yellow horse smelled putrid, like some diseased thing, and he carried a spiked whip that seemed to move in his hand of its own accord, like a snake. The rider on the gray horse carried a huge, bloody axe. They caught up to the first Horseman, and then all three of them bore straight down upon Buffy and Faith, the earth groaning beneath the hooves of their terrible steeds...

Buffy and Faith stood there, frozen, as the vampires whooped and hollered and laughed...

Buffy felt her whole body go numb. Her sword and her stake fell from her shaking hands, and she closed her eyes, and burst into tears...

“Becca...” Faith whimpered...

And then Faith heard a voice. It was a whisper on the wind, but it felt like it was right next to her...

“Mind your sister,” the voice whispered in her ear.

It was Rebecca’s voice. It allowed Faith to move again; it broke through the ice that had frozen her blood, and at the very last second Faith tackled Buffy and dragged her out of the way before the Horsemen could ride them down.

And as the Horsemen thundered past, Buffy and Faith cowered in the dirt beneath the statue of the angel, and quivered, and cried, and knew they were lost.

A moment later, they felt the vampires surrounding them. They looked up.

All of the vampires, more than a hundred, were standing in a circle around the statue now, growling.

One of the vampires stepped forward. He lurched toward them almost awkwardly, like a wolf walking on its hind legs. His red eyes looked like two pools of dried-up blood. His lips twisted into something approximating a smile.

“Look upon your world,” he snarled. “You animals will soon be extinct.”

Buffy and Faith quailed as they looked up at the vampires...at the hungry pack of wolves surrounding them. They knew they were at their mercy, and soon these wolves would tear their throats out...

The angel met the vampires’ eyes, and didn’t quail. She held her sword ready. If she thought the fight was hopeless, she kept her own counsel.

Part of Buffy and Faith wanted to fight. Part of them thought they should be lions, and leap at the wolves, snarling and biting and rending them to pieces, feeling the bones of these worthless scavengers shattering beneath their fists...

But they didn’t feel like lions anymore. They felt like something had gone out of them, had gone out of the whole world...they weren’t sure what it was, but they knew it was precious, and they didn’t think they could ever get it back...

Buffy and Faith didn’t stand up. They didn’t roar at the wolves all around them, didn’t defend their territory, didn’t spring at the wolves and tear them to pieces. Instead they stayed down in the dirt, kneeling at the angel’s feet.

They knew they weren’t lions anymore. They weren’t anything anymore... they had lost themselves...

They had lost the world.

Xander ran through the living room with a katana in his hand, nearly tripped over the coffee table, and ran out into the hallway toward the door.

“Xander, hurry!” Giles screamed, as he did his best to hold on to Willow while trying to dodge the vampire’s slashing claws. “I can’t hold her!”

Xander sprinted out the front door, holding the katana aloft...

He had no idea how to use a sword, or even how to properly hold one. All he knew for certain was that he was probably doing it wrong.

You’ll need to learn a weapon, he remembered Faith saying. A sword or an axe, something for beheading. I can teach you weapons...

But Faith was gone...he had lost her.

Screaming, Xander ran at the vampire from its right side and awkwardly swung at it with the katana...

The vampire backhanded him in the face before he could land the blow. Xander flew backwards, smashed head-first into a telephone pole, and broke his neck. He slumped to the sidewalk, dead.

“XANDER!” Giles screamed, and punched at the vampire again. The vampire slapped his fist away, and punched him in the face. Giles went flying across the room, smashed into the far wall, fell to the floor, and lay still.

The vampire dragged Willow out the window.

Buffy and Faith knelt in the dirt at the angel’s feet, holding each other, and crying. The wind had picked up; it was cold as ice and it lashed at them. It felt like whips on their skin. They looked up at the wolves surrounding them, and the wolves looked back, growling.

“Don’t worry, my pretty rabbits!” the leader of the wolves sneered, as his pack laughed. “We want you to live yet awhile. We want you to see the world you helped create. You’ll die soon enough, with the other animals.”

And with that, the vampires loped away from them and disappeared into the night, howling and cackling...

“Wh-what...do we do?” Tara whispered, as she stood at the window with Angel, and looked out into the darkness.

Angel thought about it.

He tried to see life as a series of moments. And every moment represented an opportunity...to set a new course. To determine the way all the moments that came after would unfold. Every moment was a decision that had to be made.

The scent of vampires came to him...they seemed to be everywhere.

Somewhere, he heard an explosion.

In the distance, the clouds in the black sky were lit with gold. It made the clouds look beautiful, like the sun had come out at night. But Angel knew the light meant there were fires burning downtown.

There were more screams now. Angel could hear them, coming from every direction...

He took Tara’s hand...and made a decision.

“We fight,” Angel said.

Buffy and Faith knelt in the dirt together, and held each other, and cried. Above them, the angel stood guard, tall and beautiful and resolute.

The cemetery was silent, now, and cold. The vampires were gone. Buffy and Faith were alone.

In that cold place, that resting place for dead things, they felt powerless. Under that endless black sky, they felt small, and completely alone in the world.

They didn’t talk. They held each other close, and leaned against the statue, and shivered, and tried to keep each other warm. The icy wind was relentless. It leeched the warmth from them.

They wondered what they could do, now. Should they just lie down there, in each other’s arms, and let death come?

The earth vibrated beneath them again.

Something was coming...

They heard a sound like cannon fire. It was getting louder...coming closer.

They peered out into the darkness...and saw a light...

And they saw the fourth Horseman.

The Horseman galloped straight at them, a skeleton in a black, hooded robe. But his magnificent steed was purest white, and a silver trumpet hung from its bridle, and the rider held aloft a great sword, engraved with strange runes; that sword was as long as a man, and the light they saw emanated from it. The sword shone like a beacon in that black night; for a little space around the rider, the sword turned night to day.

When they looked upon that rider, Buffy and Faith felt the blood moving in their veins again.

He checked his horse a few yards away from them, and regarded them with eyes that burned like stars, and when they looked back into those eyes Buffy and Faith would have sworn they knew that rider...they would have sworn at that moment that they had known him, every day of their lives.

“Get up,” he said.

They heard his voice, but they felt it more; they felt it in their hearts.

Buffy and Faith immediately stood up. The possibility of not doing what the Horseman told them to do didn’t even occur to them.

“Who...who...are you?” Buffy said. Her voice sounded weak and small to her ears, and entirely inconsequential.

So she was amazed when the rider actually deigned to answer her.

“You know me, Buffy Summers,” he said. “Every soldier does.”

He spurred his horse.

“War,” Faith whispered. “You’re War.”

He didn’t respond. He rode away, and took the light with him.

“Wait!” Faith shouted. “Please! Where do we go? What do we do?!”

The rider checked his horse again, and glanced back at Faith.

“Only ever two choices in this damned world, Faith,” the rider said. “Either fight like hell or knuckle under.”

It was just barely discernible, but the Horseman’s voice seemed to have a trace of a Southern accent.

And then he spurred his horse again, and galloped away, and took his light with him, and Buffy and Faith were alone in the dark.

Two Slayers stood in a cemetery at the end of the world, and looked out into the darkness together.

Somewhere, there was an explosion.

They could hear screams, echoing on the wind.

“How?” Buffy said. “How can we fight when...we already lost?”

Faith took Buffy in her arms, and kissed her. There was passion in that kiss, there was fire: it was a moment of warmth in a world gone cold.

“We haven’t lost everything,” Faith said. “We’ve got each other. And we’ve got our friends. We’re gonna find them. Tara and Will and Angel and Giles and Xander, we’re gonna find them and we’re gonna figure this thing out, come up with a plan, okay? Okay, beautiful?”

Buffy nodded.

Faith took Buffy’s hand, and kissed it. Then she raised their hands up together, and she held Buffy’s hand tight.

“See this right here?” Faith said, and looked Buffy in the eyes. “Nothing is stronger than this. Nothing in the world. Nothing.”

Buffy kissed Faith’s hand, and smiled...and then her face went pale.

“What is it?” Faith said.

“Mom,” Buffy whispered.

She broke away from Faith, and started running.

“My Mom!” Buffy screamed. “She’s out there! She’s out there ALL ALONE!”

“Buffy!” Faith shouted, and ran after her. “Buffy! Wait!”

“Mom!” Buffy shrieked, as she ran headlong and unheeding into the darkness, with no clear idea even of the direction she was heading in. “I gotta find my Mom! Mom! MOM!”

“BUFFY!” Faith screamed, and sprinted after her, and followed her into the darkness...

A moment later, the darkness swallowed them, and they could no longer be seen. A moment after that, the echoes of their voices died on the wind.

And then they were gone...lost somewhere in a world gone dark, and cold.