The Book of Days: The Journey
by WordThief
THE BOOK OF DAYS

‘I know I should keep my Slayer cool, but... it's Angel, which automatically equals maxi-wig.’
Buffy, ‘Surprise’

Part Six: The Journey

###

‘She’s fine, Mrs Summers. The blood was frightening but there was actually very little bleeding, simply a response to trauma. The baby is in no danger, I can assure you. The womb is a very safe environment, well protected even in a fall.’

‘Thank God.’ Joyce Summers had been pacing outside Giles’s bedroom for a long five minutes while Scully looked the Slayer over, and was grey faced and worried.

‘She actually has no major injuries at all. The worst I can find is a pulled muscle in her lower back. The uterine bleeding was probably caused by a quick pull to a placental edge, consistent with a twisting fall. Buffy is a very fast healer and I’m positive she will be 100% in twenty-four hours or so. You have a remarkable daughter.’

In the bedroom, Buffy was explaining to Giles and the other teenagers exactly what had transpired at the mansion, with Xander and Mulder filling in the spaces that she couldn’t. Not wanting to simply leave Buffy without backup at the mansion, they had summoned Oz from his position nearby in the getaway vehicle and parked as far up the driveway as they could. Mulder covered the entrance with Scully’s Sig. When Buffy emerged from the mansion, they were able to bundle her into the van and be at Giles’ place within minutes.

‘That was excellent thinking, Buffy - that is, as long as you’re alright.’ Giles was worried but couldn’t quite contain his enthusiasm at the way she had managed the fight.

‘Dr Scully says I’m fine - and so is junior here.’ She patted her stomach. ‘Having Spike and Drusilla gone is really going to dull things up around here. And Angel is not in a good way. When he wakes up he’s going to be as angry as hell. I broke his toy.’ She grinned.

‘I might be speaking too soon, but I find that fact makes me personally feel very safe. I feel that Angel will simply come after you now. He will be too irrationally angry to think about the rest of us. Not that I’m planning to wander around at night, but I think that if we are all cautious about our actions, Angel poses no threat to anyone but Buffy.’

‘Another good reason to leave town.’ The Slayer sighed and turned to the F.B.I agent. ‘We leave at nine, right?’ He nodded. ‘Great. Just over ten hours to get home, get some sleep, have Mom force-feed me power bars, and pack. What say those that are interested in the great departure meet at my place at eight.’ She glanced at Willow. ‘Will the glamour hold up for that long?’

‘Oh, yeah. Yeah. It’s not a strong one, but...’ she shrugged. ‘It’ll fool the police long enough to get you out of here so Dr Scully can clear your name.’

‘Thank you. I better go and find Mom, get her home.’ Buffy felt both exulted and exhausted, and smiled a tired smile at her friends. ‘Thank you all. I think we did the thing for Kendra.’

‘Yes, yes, I’ll ring Sam Zabuto, her Watcher. He will be pleased. Not that’s it’s any consolation, a Watcher just having lost his Slayer.’ Giles looked at Buffy sternly. ‘You be bloody careful out there.’

###

‘Um, Buffy?’ Cordelia moved toward the Slayer, looking almost shy. In her outstretched hands she held a professionally wrapped parcel, silver paper trimmed with sky-blue ribbon. ‘I got this for you yesterday, on the way home from school. I just thought...well, anyway, open it now, before you go, so I can know if I have to take it back.’

Buffy took the parcel and gave it an experimental shake. It didn’t seem booby-trapped. She carefully removed the ribbon and opened the gift. It was a shaped glass bottle, filled with a clear amber liquid, the legend ‘Mamatoto’ inscribed on the side. She uncorked it, and sniffed the top, then inhaled more strongly, letting the sweet smell of lavender fill her head. ‘Thank you...thank you, Cordelia. That’s really nice.’

‘Mamatoto - it means ‘Mother-baby’ well, that’s what the saleslady said. It’s a massage oil. It’ll stop you from getting stretchmarks if you use it everyday. I thought ‘What would be nice for Buffy?’, and then I thought ‘What would I want if I was pregnant?’ Not that I am, or ever will be - having a baby seems way too like messy and painful to me. And you get really fat and unattractive, and want to eat things like pickles and dirt, which personally I can’t stand. Pickles, I mean. Well, I can’t stand dirt either. As a food source.’ Cordelia shut up when she realised that most of the group was looking at her in amusement. Xander was shaking his head slowly, a rueful but affectionate grin on his face.

Buffy passed the bottle to her mother, and held her arms out, embracing Cordelia. Cordy flinched slightly, then hugged back.

‘Oh, Buffy, I almost forgot. You must take this with you. It’s the book that contains the ritual for revoking the invitation right - the other things you need are in this bag. Mr Mulder will help you with the Latin if you need it, I’m sure he’s up to it, being a fellow Oxford man.’ He passed her a small grey book and a drawstring bag. ‘Please use it everywhere you stay. You never know who’s been in a hotel room before - or who they’ve invited in.’ Willow shuddered, remembering the night they had turned Angelus from Buffy’s door just in time to get her mother safely inside.

‘Herbs and Latin, right.’ She glanced at Willow. ‘Wish you were coming, Will, but you’ll be needed here.’

'Yeah. I'm spell-girl. I get to stay at Giles's house.' She smiled. 'Oz is too. Oh, my parents would not like this. Um, but they're not here. Again. So they won't know. Oooh, I'm bad!'

‘Buffy? May I, uh, speak to you privately before you leave, just for minute.’ Giles looked even more concerned than usual. The pair left the others packing the car, and sat on the Summers’s front steps.

‘I just wanted you to know, before you left that I made two phone calls earlier this morning. The Watcher’s Council has accepted your decision. The moment the new Slayer is found they are going to send her here to cover the Hellmouth until things get back to normal, and we will both have a hand in her training. The whole council are lamenting that the called Slayer is not from one of the traditional families. I don’t know why they are complaining, a good seventy-five percent of Slayers aren’t. Also, in that way she will be a more like you than Kendra, who knew she would be called even as a child. You will be able to help her cope more effectively’

‘Well, I guess that’s a good. For her, at least.’

‘The other phone call I made was to tell Sam Zabuto of Drusilla’s death. Unfortunately, I couldn’t. Kendra’s Watcher committed suicide yesterday.’ Buffy drew a horrified breath. ‘This has been known to happen before. When a Watcher loses their Slayer......I have dreamed such things before, and those dreams are almost unbearable. That is why I want you to be careful. Don’t take any more chances while you are away. I shouldn’t be sending you away from here, I should be going with you, but I...I can’t, and the situation is unprecedented. Please, Buffy, watch your back.’

She reached for him and enfolded him in a hug. ‘I will. I promise. You work hard with Miss Scully and get the police off my case, and help Willow with that ritual, and I’ll be home as soon as possible. And I promise I’ll do more Slayer study. Train more. Whatever you want.’

‘I do believe you are only saying that because you know I’m going to have to decrease your training soon.’ He pulled out of the hug and regarded her wryly. ‘And you complain that you’re too busy already. Just wait until you are a mother.’

‘Giles, don’t push it. That’s months away.’

‘Not as long as you think, I suspect. Just - come back alive, and soon.’ He suddenly looked embarrassed, and pushed his glasses further up the bridge of his nose. ‘Look - I think your mother and Mr Mulder are ready to go.’

She sprang to her feet and helped him up, and together they walked across the lawn towards the waiting car.

###

Buffy walked along the roadside. She was wearing comfortable but ugly peasant sandals and a loose dress a little to big for her. She wasn’t quite sure where she was going, but he had told her this was the place, and there was only one house on the lane.

Her feet seemed to move forward of their own accord, allowing her to check out her surroundings. The sun was bright and hot, and much lower in the sky than she was used to. Coupled with the almost silence - no birds singing, no wind to rustle the trees - the effect was quite eerie. But now there was noise, the sound of someone singing, and she wondered how she could not have heard it before. She felt the clear, beautiful soprano voice drawing her in, through the gate towards the house, which wasn’t really a house at all, more like a shored up wooden caravan on old-fashioned cartwheels. The name over the carved mailbox read ‘Kalderash’.

‘I sing because I’m happy...I sing because I’m free.....’

The doorway was small with a heavy lintel. A sign over the doorway proclaimed ‘Thou who art gaunt of soul, enter, for here thou will find thy light.’

‘His eye is on the sparrow.... And He watches over me.’

Buffy stood in the doorway, not surprised to see Cordelia sitting on a wooden three-legged stool, singing to the infant in her arms. The girl looked up, startled.

‘Don’t stop. Don’t stop singing.’ Buffy heard herself say.

‘Oh! Buffy! Oh I’m glad you’re back early. I wanted to go and get ready to go out tonight! But, I mean it’s okay, if you need more time, that’s fine. I’m sure I’ll be alright in this old thing.’ The Slayer noticed that Cordelia was wearing her favourite lavender Chanel suit, and looked down dismayed at her own peasant rags.

‘No, it’s okay. I missed him anyway. I’m ready.’

The brunette stood and gently turned the baby over to Buffy, who held him tight. ‘How was he?’

‘Oh, he was an angel.’ Cordelia brushed down the front of her suit pants. ‘You should let me look after him more often.’

‘I don’t think Mom would let me. She loves watching him too much.’

‘I know she does - Oh, that’s right, I forgot. His father came to visit him. They had a great time.’ She looked reproachfully at Buffy. ‘You know, you really should let them see more of each other. Every little boy needs his Daddy.’ She turned and stepped through the straw covering the floor towards the door.

Buffy laid the child down on the blanketed change table, and unwrapped his carrying clothes to change him. His arms and legs drooped pathetically and she gasped, clutching him to her breast again. The double puncture wounds on his neck were smeared red with drying blood. She looked up in horror. Cordelia was gone, but over the doorway was something that she had not noticed before. High up the wall, above the lintel, the word ‘Mamatoto’ was scrawled in blood.

###

Buffy sat up with a start. Sleep had made her groggy and disorientated, and for a moment she didn’t know where she was.

‘Are you okay, honey?’ Joyce swivelled around in the front passenger seat and looked concernedly at her daughter.

‘Yeah, I’m..uh..I’m fine I guess. I was just dreaming...a strange dream. Where are we?’

‘Just out of Omaha.’ Mulder answered her. ‘It’s just after six o’clock, so we’re gonna stop here, grab a bite to eat and find a hotel to hole up in before it gets dark. I haven’t seen any signs of any following traffic.’

‘Okay. Um...Mr Mulder?’

‘Yeah?’

‘Please not a Holiday Inn this time.’

True to that request, ninety minutes later they were settled into the only non-Holiday Inn two-bedroom suite left on the motorway leaving Omaha to the east. The two adults sat a protesting Buffy down and went over their ‘Doctor-and-Watcher’s-Pregnant-Slayer-Care-Inventory.’

‘Same as last night, Mom! No nausea, no vomiting, no spotting, no cramps - no nothing. I feel fine!’

‘Buffy, you know we have to check. I for one will feel a lot better when we get you to an Ob-Gyn in Washington. You heard Agent Scully say that babies aren’t her speciality - no insult to her abilities of course.’ Joyce added, glancing at Mulder.

He smiled. ‘Most of her patients are already dead. That puts a stop to the reproduction thing.’

‘Didn’t stop Angel.’ Joyce muttered under her breath. Buffy, however, caught this comment, and began to giggle, surprising even herself.

‘I’m sorry, that’s what’s wrong with me. I’m really tired and I even found that funny when it isn’t really, and I think maybe I should just go to bed. Mom?’

‘Okay, off you go. I’ll be in later - about half an hour. Mr Mulder and I are going to plan tomorrow’s itinerary.’

‘Okay. Have fun.’ She threw them a knowing smirk as she headed for the bathroom.

Joyce was taken aback. ‘I think my daughter has a dirty mind!’ she exclaimed as she plunked herself down at the table and reached for the road atlas.

###

‘Nine o’clock check-in!’ Buffy’s voice came bright and cheery over the phone.

‘Buffy! How are you? No, wait. Give me the details first for Dr Scully, then we can talk.’

‘Okay. We’re in Indiana. Mr Mulder says...wait...zone 4..6..5..1. 4651.’ She was quiet a minute and Giles could almost see her pouting with impatience as Mulder gave her further coordinates for the Gunmen’s GPS tracker. ‘Then, area sixty-three. Is that it? I still don’t know why we have to do this. Okay, Giles, that’s it.’

‘Excellent. How are you all holding up?’

‘We’re tired, so we’re not moving on tomorrow. We’re staying in Gary. Mom’s pretty cheerful. Mr Mulder’s sick of driving. I’m okay..except, I’ve been having dreams. The nasty technicolour this-is-your-future type. Starring Angel, and other people...and my son.’

‘Oh, Buffy. How bad?’

‘Bad. Not wanting to sleep bad.’

Giles sat down slowly on the edge of the couch. Willow watched him curiously from the armchair, her eyes full of questions. ‘Well, Buffy, I..ah..I would, I would tell you not to worry, it’s probably caused by the stress you are under, with the travel, and the baby and everything, but you have a history of incredibly portent dreams, so this is worrying. Can you..ah..can you give me some details? How realistically possible are the things that have happened in your dreams?’

Willow’s eyes took on a look of understanding. Behind her, Scully was entering with a tray of hot drinks, which she placed on the coffee table. She sat, and curled her legs up underneath her as she listened.

‘Well, mainly, well - a common theme is Angel kills the baby, and I’m not there to do anything about it. Everyone else just does nothing.’ Far from the bubbly voice that had started the conversation, Buffy now sounded tense and wound up.

‘Buffy, you must relax. You’ve learnt how not to let things get to you. Now, listen. The situation with Angel _will_ be resolved before your baby is born. Dreams are not necessarily prophecy. Sometimes they’re just reflections of your waking fears, presented in a slightly different way.’

‘I know. But that doesn’t really make it much easier.’ Giles realised that she was even more upset than he had thought, and this was confirmed in the next thing she said. ‘Look, I’ve gotta go, Mom’s got food. Mr Mulder wants to talk to Dr Scully.’

‘Buffy, wait...’

Willow looked down at her mug, thoughtful and listening. As he passed the phone across to Scully, she stood, and sat beside the Watcher and took his hand.

‘Giles, she’s gonna be fine.’

He wiped his brow. ‘I certainly hope so.’

###

After five days of being given the run around by the detectives working homicide in Sunnydale, Scully had finally managed to get a series of statements booked in as evidence of Buffy’s innocence in the murder of Kendra. At all times she had felt something subtle and unnamed working against her, something that gave her the same feeling she had felt in the autopsy bay with the dead Slayer, the same feeling as she had looking into the lair of Spike and Drusilla, watching them dance their strange arguments and their love and their hate for each other. However, the statements were booked in, and something would have to be done about them. The manhunt had been called off, but Buffy was still the prime suspect and not in the clear until Scully could bring Det. Daniels to go through the evidence. That might take a few days.

However, now she was playing research assistant. Willow, with a catch-up final the next day, had been persuaded to take a break from the work on the ritual and go back to her room at Giles’s to study. Cordelia was on an overnight shopping trip to L.A. with her mother. Oz and Xander were out on their now regular patrol, Xander having decided that sitting a final wasn’t for him, he’d settle for an aegrotat. There had been no sign of any vampires in the time since Buffy had smashed up Acathla.

Scully was flicking through a journal of documentation of the mystics in Rumanian culture when Giles appeared through the stacks, weighed down with a load of journals and books. He dumped them on the table beside her and sat down opposite, picking the first off the pile and opening it.

Scully stretched and yawned. ‘Rupert. How about we take a break?’

He looked at his watch. ‘Oh, yes, very well. Coffee?’ He disappeared into his office, returning several minutes later with two steaming mugs.

‘So, tell me about the kids.’ Scully picked up her mug and smiled at him, knowing from the look on his face that she’d struck a chord in the man.

‘Well..ah..they’re remarkable..people, really, all of them, without exception.’

‘I’ve noticed. In the week I’ve been in Sunnydale, I’ve seen them do some very brave, very loyal things. You must be proud of them.’

‘Yes, yes, I am.’ He put down his tea and brushed a pile of papers aside. ‘They’ve all done a lot of growing up in the last year, Buffy especially. They can occasionally be trying, but...well, the Slayer is supposed to work alone, in secret, but now I wouldn’t have it any other way than this.’

‘Willow especially impresses me.’

‘Yes, she has a very good head on her shoulders, and she’s just becoming aware of her potential. I don’t know what I would do without her help, sometimes. She’s very dedicated, and her and Buffy are very close.’

‘And the others?’

‘Well, Xander is improving. He tries hard, and he’s very protective of Buffy, but sometimes he gets caught up in jealousy. However, he keeps us all in good spirits. Cordelia...’ He sighed and shook his head ruefully. ‘Cordelia..has also..improved, and is...occasionally brave beyond the call of duty. She has an innate sense of self-preservation that I admire. And Oz..Oz is doing very well despite his disability.’

‘Disability?’

‘Oz is..is a werewolf.’

Scully’s eyes opened wide and she blinked a couple of times, trying to force the laugh back down her throat. She only half-way succeeded, and her words were tinged with laughter. ‘Oh dear. I don’t think I’ll ever get used to this.’

‘This is the Hellmouth. I think you’ll find that none of us is used to it. Hopefully we never will be. But, I worry. I hope that we will all be ready for what is coming...I hope that they will all be willing and able to fight.’ His voice had suddenly grown strangled and strange. ‘Buffy’s dreams are probably portents, and have made me realise just how close it is.’

‘What’s coming?’

Giles looked up at her, tears welling in his eyes. ‘Millennium. It’s the millennium soon, the true millennium. All prophecies speak of the coming of a darkness so deep, so..so strong, over and over. I fear for us all. But most of all I fear for..for Buffy. She’s like a daughter to me, she’s my family, I love her more than anything. She’s also the only destiny I have. The thought that we may lose her now...that I may lose her...’ He faltered.

Scully reached across the table, taking both his hands in hers.

‘Destiny?’

‘I began training as a Watcher when I was ten. My Grandmother was the Watcher for a Slayer in London during the first world war, when she was still a young woman. It was a dangerous time - vampires like war almost as much as they love natural disasters. Petra - my grandmother’s Slayer, survived only seven months after she was called. She was fourteen.’

‘That’s so young - even younger than Buffy.’ Scully frowned. ‘Fourteen...amazing.’

‘Buffy herself was only fifteen when she was called. Her first Watcher was killed before she came to the Hellmouth. Buffy is, well..rather different than the ‘model’ Slayer. Very atypical. Petra was more by the book by all accounts, a little more like Kendra. Traditional. Of course I never met her, but my father was trained, then I in turn. Father never had the responsibility of a Slayer. When he died...he, well, I know he regretted not having had the chance. As hard as it is. When I was called to America, I went with great dread, but also with great joy. My destiny, you see...’

‘And training others? Do you train a new Watcher?’

‘Yes, yes, I have already begun.’ He smiled, but it was a small, sad smile. ‘Although she doesn’t know it yet. In the end she will have to choose whether to follow the path. We Watchers have...more choice......than the Slayer we serve.’

‘Then maybe Willow is also your destiny. If the prophecies are correct, you have a lot to prepare her for.’

‘Very perceptive - I mean, that you knew it wasn’t Cordelia I was speaking of.’ The smile was real this time, reaching the Watcher’s eyes..

Pleased at his smile, she squeezed his hands quickly over the table. He was quiet for a while, then seemed to gather himself together. ‘I see you’ve donned a bit of protection - very prudent.’ He indicated the small cross around her neck. ‘Yes, yes, we wouldn’t want to lose you at this stage, although I’m sure you’re more sensible than the girls. And Xander. And..quite possibly myself. I’m sorry, am I being a bit of a mother hen? You must excuse me. Buffy calls me on it quite often. Although she has to admit I have reason to worry...’ He trailed off, realising that she looked upset. ‘I’m sorry, have I offended you?’

‘No, it’s alright - I...’ Scully made a decision and manoeuvred herself forward in her chair. ‘Actually, this means more to me than protection. I have always managed to find a way to integrate my science and my faith, but now this - what I’ve seen, what you and the kids live with everyday - how do I reconcile that?’

‘Dr Scully, you have read, and you have heard, of Buffy’s calling as the Slayer. Throughout the annals of Slayer history, right from recorded time, books of prophecy and guidance speak of the Slayer as the Chosen One. And the implication is made.’

Scully picked up on the man’s train of thought. ‘And having a Chosen One implies a Chooser, a higher power? Isn’t that a bit simplistic?’

‘Shortly after Buffy came to Sunnydale, she came to me with all the big questions, the questions about her calling. She was angry, and frightened, and she demanded answers that I don’t have. The real answers she wasn’t ready for. She still isn’t. When she is older, ready, she will come to me again and I will be able to tell her where to look. Where to begin. But that first premise, that of the Chooser and the Chosen, is the best explanation there is. It means that there is a reason for everything that is happening here and now.’

He sighed, and looked at his hands, then back up at her. ‘As much as we don’t like it, the answers are the same for every human. It’s a journey. One must look inside oneself, search for truth. Very seldom are we just given an answer. Few people are given a burning bush.’

Scully nodded and took a sip of her coffee, which was growing cold. After a minute of silence, she smiled at him, then lifted a book down from the pile, and proceeded to read.

###

Giles threw his front door open wide and almost ran into the room, panicked and breathless.

‘I got your message. What the hell happened?...Oh...vampires. Thank God you’re all right.’

Willow wrung out a facecloth and applied it to the wound that extended across her boyfriend’s forehead, from his left brow to the the hairline above his right eye. Xander was laid out on the couch, and Scully was removing his cast in order to reset the arm that had been reinjured.

‘Vampire. Singular.’ Oz was his usual laconic self, even with a bleeding head wound. ‘Well, one vampire, one mortal.’

‘A mortal?’ Giles closed the door and crossed the room to kneel at Willow’s side. ‘Please - start at the beginning.’

Xander grunted in pain. His face was white, and he grimaced as Scully manipulated the cracked, spent cast off his arm. He took a deep breath as Scully injected painkiller into his arm, then manoeuvred his head so Giles was in his line of sight.

‘We thought..I thought..we went into Willie’s bar to see if we could find out why there’s been so little activity lately. And see if we could find out where dead-boy is.’

Giles was appalled. ‘Oh, Xander. How could you? You both could have been killed!’

Xander held up his other arm, palm face out. ‘Wait, wait. I know it was dumb. But I’m glad we did it.’ Oz nodded, prompting a ‘Stay still’ from Willow. Xander continued, ‘We went in to the bar, and I told Willie to do what he had to do, Buffy was on her way. He looked at me strangely, and then nodded. He said something in a strange language, and, I swear, half the people in the bar just up and left, slipped away.’

‘Well, we had Willie the snitch up against the wall, and Oz reminded him it was only a few days till the full moon. That got him talking. He knew Buffy had left town, but most of the vamps don’t. They’re without a leader, and there hasn’t been much hunting lately. The underground’s on edge after Acathla. And Angel’s gone.’

Giles felt his blood run cold. ‘Gone?’

‘Gone after Buffy. He left three nights ago. He’s following her trail, alone, and he’s going to kill her. We have to warn her!’ He struggled, trying to sit up, but Scully pushed him firmly down again. Oz, his wound dressed, took over.

‘Then Xander had to go get all threatening, and this chick-vamp came out of nowhere and went at us until Willie told her to stop. Then he took our stakes and told us not to bring our threats around here again.’

Giles appeared not to have heard this. ‘Yes, you’re right. We must tell Buffy. She will have to be extra vigilant. I don’t think Angel will stop at anything now he’s decided to go after her. Will Mr Mulder’s phone be in range? They’re probably asleep.’

Scully nodded, her attention still mostly on her patient. ‘Rupert, we need to get both these boys to the hospital. Oz needs stitches, and I don’t want to do them here.’

‘Yes, yes of course. just let me ring Buffy.’

He picked up the phone, and pressed the button for the number that had recently been added to his speed dial. It rang ten times, twelve, and just as he was about to lose hope a breathless voice answered the phone, young and female.

‘Agent Mulder’s phone, can I help you?’

‘Buffy, Angel has left Sunnydale, and he’s on your trail.’

###

End of Part Six.

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