Fifty Six
Loki looked down between himself and the vampire as Spike drew away slightly. The stake was odd, wasn’t it? A few seconds passed as a stabbing pain began to emerge from Loki’s own chest. Looking down, he saw he had driven the long thing through the vampire’s heart and out his chest, all the way into his own chest. Blood stained the white silk as he pulled away with a jerk, letting the vampire stumble back with the black spike protruding from his chest. Loki’s hand found his wound and pressed it hard, causing the pain to explode to excruciating proportions. He groaned and fell back to the floor, his entire stomach now drenched in blood.
As Spike cried out in pain and staggered back from the embrace, he looked down as well to see what was piercing him. He took the thin pointy end and tried to pull it free from himself, not sure why he hadn’t become part of the dusty atmosphere. One tug told him there was something capping the other end of the weapon. Perhaps it was not a stake at all.
Loki looked up from his bloodied hand to see the vampire stagger and turn his back on the conjurer, revealing the small piece of skull out of which the weapon had grown in life. The conjurer’s eyes darted to the faces of the monks still encircling the two combatants. A young monk with red hair slipped back into the crowd, drawing his robes closer about himself. Loki’s eyes continued to search and soon came to rest on the slayer.
Buffy pushed aside the monks of the circle after she had seen Loki fall for the last time. She shoved aside the one nearest him and stood over the bloodied master. He gasped and looked up at her, scrambling back until he was against the overturned table’s top, the water soaking into his khakis as he sat in the puddle. The slayer approached him slowly, walking as he had, one foot ahead of the other, heel to toe.
“You’re not her,” Loki gasped, his eyes blurring and his heart pounding. His kaya were turning now, sickeningly, dipping and swinging through his mind as the sunyata hissed and swirled in furious chaos. Chaos was only order spoken with contempt, he told himself. And kayak down the Mekong. He shook his head. The monks behind the slayer shot back into the distance as his vision narrowed. There was only her now. Who was she? He suddenly remembered he was bleeding. He glanced down at the stab wound left by Tory’s cane... or was it the Werlech’s horn? He chuckled and choked, tasting the salt of tears or blood or strawberries. No, no; it was butterscotch ice cream, not strawberry. He looked up and someone else was there.
Hanna was there. The world screamed back into focus. Angel was there, Whistler was there, the monks were there. Jade was there, beside Oz, smiling, calling him a sick fuck. He wasn’t sick, he was injured. Hanna reached down, her pretty face smiling its usual angelic smile. She kissed her fingers and touched his forehead. A smile flickered across his lips as his kaya spun faster and faster. The Mekong rushed past him, leaving Chamdo behind. The mist was all around his kayak, thick and opaque. The water couldn’t be seen far ahead. His smile flickered.
Dawn stood beside Buffy, looking down at the conjurer on the floor. He had reached out into the air with his blood covered hand, grabbing for something, then reaching down into puddle in which he sat. His hand met the surface of the water with a spark of green energy. The Key had been awoken again. Not for centuries this time, only for moments had it been at rest in its watery home. Now it was called again, by the blood of a specter.
Loki’s eyes shot wide as the entity moved up through him, forcing his mind back to reality. He gasped in pain and his eyes focused on the two girls standing above him. “Hanna,” he muttered, reaching out, the green electricity still crackling between his fingers. Dawn recoiled and stepped out of his reach, swallowing hard.
“We finish this now,” Spike advanced on the fallen foe, seizing Xander’s short sword and lifting it above his head. He ignored the horn that still protruded from his chest, now that he knew it wouldn’t kill him, and brought his blade down for a lethal strike.
But the hand of the slayer stayed the swing. She caught the vampire’s hand and twisted until the blade clattered to the floor. He shot her a glare of confusion and betrayal. Her face, however, was gentle and sad. “It is finished.” With a challenging look that dared the blond haired vamp to cross her, Buffy sent Spike out of the circle of monks to where Giles was waiting.
Buffy held her sister’s arm and turned her away from the delusional conjurer. Three monks had knelt by Loki to examine his wounds. Spike was resting with a hand against a wall, groaning as Giles slowly drew the demon horn from his back. Xander held his short sword at the ready, he and Anya still suspicious of each person in brown.
Dawn finally looked her sister in the face with recognition for the first time since they had met on the floor earlier. Buffy’s expression was one of incomprehension. “Why?” she demanded, the question finally finding vocalization. “Don’t you trust me? What do you know that I don’t?”
Dawn had nothing but serenity in her face. The confusion had been lifted. She had found what she had been looking for. An ancient sense of peace and wisdom that few ever found within themselves had been glimpsed, just barely, by the girl as she found that consciousness she had been missing. It was there, she knew now. Little else mattered. “It’s not about trust,” she said gently. There was none of the resentfulness she might have exhibited in response to one of her sister’s other lectures. For once, she was the one with the answers. “It wasn’t hard to choose, in the end,” she explained calmly. “I looked at you,” she said simply, “and I looked at him,” she glanced down as Loki brushed away the monks with an annoyed expression, “and I realized that when this was all over, I would be going home to you.”
Buffy blinked. “But you didn’t listen to me. Everything we knew said you would vanish; disappear without a trace or- or a memory, and you did it anyway. Why?”
Dawn made a sad little smile. “I can live with you being angry at me, resenting that I was right: that Loki was telling the truth — as long as I know that you and mom will be there waiting for me... in the end.” She turned away from the conjurer and took her sister for once by the shoulders, speaking as she was often spoken to - as if it were critical that the point be heard and understood. “But I couldn’t have lived hating you —not forgiving you— if I’d listened to you and you’d been wrong. I couldn’t do that.”
The slayer let her sister slowly release her shoulders. Of course. There was a gurgling and both turned to Loki on the floor. He motioned, lucidly, for Dawn to approach. The green energy had subsided and Dawn came to realize what that meant. A heartbeat later, Buffy did as well: the ritual had done what each of them had thought it would. Loki had gotten from Dawn what he had wanted since her creation and Dawn had also.
Dawn slowly approached and knelt in the once again empty puddle. She smiled sadly. There was no fear any more. He had nothing she wanted, she needed. They were former teacher and former student. “How does it feel?” she asked curiously. “Being in my shoes?”
He coughed and laughed at the same time. The smile found his eyes and he raised an eyebrow. “I could ask you the same question,” he croaked. “Is it everything you ever dreamed it would be?”
Dawn’s eyes searched his, as if the correct answer were there somewhere. Finally she cracked a sincere grin. “Yes, it is.” He nodded appreciatively, his head lolling to one side. Dawn looked about them to the pieces of broken urn among the cobbles and found what she was looking for. Her fingers closed around the tiny glass sphere and she lifted it from the puddle. A bead of water rolled off it’s surface and fell like a tear to the floor. She placed the littlest Dagon Sphere in the conjurer’s red-stained hand and closed his fingers around it. “Your quest stone,” she said with a half hearted smile. “I hope you find what you’re looking for.”
Loki looked up into his daughter’s face. His breath was ragged now. He couldn’t feel his legs. The water around him was no longer clear and his shirt was no longer white. His vision began to narrow again and soon it fogged over altogether. The voices persisted, however, echoing as if in a cave as his kaya spun before him, faster and faster now that the sphere was clenched numbly in his hand. The bright light began to shine from his center. His breathing slowed.
Dawn slowly stood as Loki’s eyes closed. The room was silenced. With a flash of green, the conjurer vanished, making the monks scramble back in surprise. There were mutters and grumbling among them as the light show subsided and the monks were left standing in the stone room with no sign of the visitors.
31 June, 2002, Sunnydale
Buffy looked around herself in surprise. She and the others found themselves in the Magic Box, unsure of how they had gotten there, even more unsure of exactly what had just happened.
Willow alone stood and spoke, surprised to see them all at once, all of a sudden. “Dawnie!” She said gleefully, rushing over to hug the still robed girl. “You’re alright!”
Dawn blinked at the attention and then returned the hug. “Yeah– whoa, yeah I’m fine.” The group exchanged prolonged glances with each other, as if trying to reassure each other that what had happened was real.
“Did it work?” Willow looked from one face to the next. “Did I change history or anything?” She bit her lip. “I didn’t mess it up or anything, did I? `Cause I know I’ve been a little out of practice since..." she remembered her intermittent visits to the coven in England over the last few months, "...and everything, but the spell was pretty straight forward and—”
“Wills,” Buffy said gently. “You didn’t screw up.” The witch exhaled with relief.
“Yeah, I don’t think it worked,” Xander shrugged, “I mean I don’t think anything’s changed, but there were no big screw-ups as far as I can tell.”
Willow looked a little crest-fallen. “Yeah, I guess I still need a bit more practice before I’m, you know, fully back on the band-wagon and all that.”
“Don’t worry,” Buffy said encouragingly, “you’ll get there.”
“Yes, I have no doubt,” Giles put in encouragingly. “Though the important thing is that everyone is back and safe and... whole, I suppose,” he looked a little troubled, then glanced at Dawn.
The teen looked down sheepishly. “Yeah... guys...” she looked up timidly, her hands clasped behind her back, “I’m really really sorry about dragging you guys all over the place looking for me.”
Buffy took the apology in stride. “Well, the important thing is that you’re safe. And my credit card is safe. And you have a soul... my soul. Our soul.” She frowned. “How does that work again?”
“I’m sure there are some helpful leather bound books on the subject,” Xander suggested, indicating the laden bookshelves.
“No,” the slayer cut him off. “No more books. Let’s... go watch some good quality television.” She put her arm around her sister. “I think we’re overdue for some togetherness, don’t you?” Her sister smiled and hugged the slayer tightly.
“You always save me,” she whispered through a dreamy expression.
Buffy returned the hug and soon Anya joined in, followed by Xander and Willow. Giles rolled his eyes and Spike quietly slipped out the back.
“Buffy?” Dawn asked in the center of the group hug.
“Mm, yes?” the slayer answered happily, her eyes closed, her head resting on Dawn’s shoulder.
“Your credit card’s in Tibet.”
Spike strolled into his crypt to find Clem watching television. “You still here?” The vampire asked, immediately removing the shirt which now bore a hole in the front and back.
“Just looking after things for a bit,” the demon said mildly. “Where you been?”
Spike reached for a fresh black shirt and stopped, letting the events of the past ten days filter through his mind. “You ever get the feelin’ you were part of something bigger — something you weren’t meant to understand, but now that you’ve caught a glimpse, you just can’t stop thinkin’ about it?”
Clem stared at the vampire blankly for a moment or two. “No.” He shook his head, his ears flopping side to side.
The vampire shrugged and collapsed down beside the television. “So what’s on?”
“He had a normal life,” the TV announcer said dramatically, “until one fateful date changed it all. Catch ‘Man With Extremely Tiny Head’ next on FOX.”
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