Mine! Mine! ALLLLLLL Mine!
juuuuuust kidding.
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Part Two
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Buffy came into the library only a few minutes before the first bell rang, Willow and Oz trailing unsteadily behind her. Giles was hunched over a book, studying intently.
"Hey, Giles," Buffy said. "A little light reading?" She lifted up the book -- to his mild protests -- and let it drop back to the table. "Viktor's Interpretation of Mystical Dreams?" A sober look came over her face. "We're not entering prophecy territory again, are we?"
"Not to my knowledge; I'm just looking up something for -- erm -- a friend, who has been having dreams she thinks may be significant."
Willow perked up at that; she and Oz had been kind of leaning against one another, mostly for support. "Really, Giles?" she said, stifling a yawn. "She?"
The Watcher answered, "Nothing like that," with none of the usual embarassment. "Actually, it's Cordelia."
"Cordelia?" all three said in unison.
"I didn't think there was much to it, but I promised her I'd do a little work on it -- to ease her fears, if nothing else. Only now --"
"I don't like the way you just said now, Giles," Buffy said. "I hate it when you say now that way."
"To my knowledge, this is the first time I've actually said it that way," the librarian said.
Oz said, standing clear of Willow and rubbing his collarbone, "I think it was the not liking that was important. But, you know me, I could be wrong --"
"Here's the problem, Buffy," Giles said. "I still can't find conclusive proof one way or the other that Cordelia's dreams meant anything. But there are a couple of disturbing coincidences. In Cordelia's dream -- almost the entire population of Sunnydale was in a pit, they were all building something, and she had to sing to save them from the spell they were under."
"Hmmm," Buffy said mock-thoughtfully. "Cordy singing versus being under a spell. Cordy's singing versus being under a spell . . ." at Oz's puzzled look, she said, "That's right, you never heard her sing. Call you Mr. Lucky."
"Bad?"
"Let's, let's just say," Giles said, "That calling her attempts at vocalization 'caterwauling' is an insult to felines everywhere. Now, there are records of vaguely similar occurrences in the past -- right before the vanishings of twenty or so of the best and brightest in the locales near the dreamer, but nothing on this scale. The trouble is is that there is absolutely nothing in here about song of any sort."
"Giles," Buffy said as Willow and Oz plopped heavily into chairs, "I told you once there were two things I didn't believe in, coincidence and leprechauns. Well, this is definitely one of them, and I don't see any small men with green hats running around --"
"It gets worse," Giles said.
"Why can't you ever say 'it gets better?'" Willow said, a bit more curtly than usual.
"Because it so rarely does," Giles snapped back.
"Okay, who put the nasty juice in your cups this morning?" Buffy asked.
"Sorry, Giles," Willow said. "I just haven't been sleeping well recently."
Giles head snapped upwards so sharply Buffy was afraid her Watcher would get whiplash. "That's even worse news, because neither have I -- and neither, I suspect, has Oz -- or even you, Buffy, though your Slayer strength appears to have you in better shape than the rest of us."
"That's not saying much," Oz moaned. "I feel like I've been running marathons every night instead of sleeping."
As sharply as he could, Giles said, "Could the three of you scope this out and see how other people have been sleeping?"
'Will do, boss man," Buffy said.
"And speaking of how people feel -- how is Xander doing?"
"Stomach flu in full bloom," Willow said. "Ick factor times twelve. No eating, no drinking, no nothing."
"We ALL know how that feels," Giles replied. "Let him know I hope he feels better." Then, with a noticeable lack of bounce to their step, the three students left the library to head to class.
* * *
She walked into the lunchroom steadily but without her normal grace. Now, she was tired, having gotten only six hours of sleep at most, but, God! compared to everyone else she saw, she was positively little Miss ultracaffeinated.
Normally the lunchroom would have been reasonably animated, but today, whatever conversations there were were quiet and hushed. The lunch at the line was a cold cut sandwich -- not that the cheerleader would be eating that, anyway, with the diet she was on, but please! Where was the pride in workmanship?
She looked around for an empty table, and finally found one. Harmony sneered as she passed, but otherwise no one gave her any kind of hard time. Her reputation would be a long time in recovering from having been dumped by Xander Harris -- but it had taught her one thing, and that's that if you don't respect the opinions of the people insulting you, what they say can't hurt you in the least.
Which would mean that she'd respected Xander, and Buffy, and that group, to still be stung by their words and actions. Well, so be it. She still respected them enough to know that they'd provide some solution if her dreams were some kind of prophecy. So she still respected even Xander at some level? So be it. She WAS completely innocent in all of this anyway.
She carefullly sipped from her bottle of spring water and ate the apple as she watched the people pass by, truth be told, there wasn't a guy in the room who was worth giving a second glance, at least not today. Everyone but her and Buffy -- and Jonathan! -- seemed to be absolutely dragging, physically and mentally exhausted. Mrs. Landers, the sub in English while Mr. Lavoie recovered from the broken he arm he got when he fell out of bed, had spent five minutes trying to lead the class in a discussion of _The Merchant of Venice_ before anyone thought to remind her that they were actually reading _Julius Caesar_.
Before she'd gotten involved with Buffy and her merry gang of Ghostbusters she would have rationalized all of this away. For the last two months she'd been praying to have that blindness return, with no luck. It was like trying to go back to being a virgin!
--or so she'd been told. Anyway, with her damned monstervision at 20/20 she couldn't help but see these things. Just thank the gods someone else had to deal with them now. Find out if the dream's a prophecy and pass it along. She supposed she should also bring up this general decaffeinated state everyone was wandering around in, too.
She finished with the apple and started to get up when Buffy walked by.
"Hey, Cordy," she said.
"Buffy," she answered coolly, with a slight nod of her head.
"How are you feeling today?"
"Do you really care?"
"Believe it or not, yes, I do," Buffy said.
"Well, I DON'T believe. You only put up with me because of Xander. Well, newsflash: He betrayed me and we broke up. You can quit pretending you like me, okay?" Actually, she wasn't sure whether Buffy cared or not, but that wasn't the point.
Buffy sighed. "Alright then. Blame me for trying," and she walked over to where Willow and Oz were standing by the cafeteria door. Oz, now -- was he whipped or what? Gets the same shock, the same treatment, and he goes meekly back to Willow within a few weeks. Self-esteem classes, STAT!
And where was Xander?
-- NOT like she cared!
* * *
On the pretext of making a surprise inspection of some of the city's facilities, Mayor Wilkins and Deputy Mayor Finch walked into the Sunnydale water processing plant. After fifteen minutes of bullshitting, they finally got some time back to themselves. They walked to the intake area, the Deputy Mayor carrying a small bag of powder a bit carelessly.
"Might want to watch what you're doing with that," the Mayor said calmly. "If a single speck of that gets in your body you'll fall asleep on me."
"That doesn't sound so bad," Finch said.
"Falling asleep on the job is very serious, you should know that," his Honor answered amiably. "I might have to give you the axe." Finch panicked. "Oh, relax! I'm only kidding. They don't need weapons, not with the teeth they have."
The Deputy Mayor gripped the bag even more tightly. Then, as he gently, carefully sprinkled it into the city's water supply, the mayor chanted something from a small book he'd been carrying. Normally the Mayor didn't take a personal hand in this -- deniability, and all -- but Hypnos was fussy, and the Mayor really only trusted himself to do it right. Then, abruptly, a few minutes later, his honor closed the book and started marching out. Finch, startled, almost dropped the bag, but recovered and hurried out the door after him.
"Well done," Mayor Wilkins said as if he meant it. "Just one thing. Until tomorrow, treat Sunnydale like you would any small Mexican village."
"Huh?"
"Don't drink the water."
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