"If I should die before I wake" - Chapter 2
by
Gaius Petronius
DISCLAIMER:
Buffy the Vampire Slayer and all the characters that appear on
the show are the exclusive property of Joss Whedon, the WB, Fox
and Mutant Enemy, Inc. I only borrow them, mess with their heads,
make them cry and, every once in a while, torture them. I do lay
claim to the character of Johannes Martel since he is the central
character in an original novel I've been working on now for too
many years.
Spoilers: BtVS season two. Originally written in script format
during the spring of 1998, "If I should die before I wake"
is the sequel to my first Buffy novel, "Carpe Diem."
Rating: PG-13 for violence and language.
* * * * * * * *
"But in the grey of the morning,
My mind becomes confused
Between the dead and the sleeping
And the road that I must choose."
The Moody Blues, "Question," 1970
* * * * * * * *
"Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep.
If I should die before I wake,
I pray the Lord my soul to take."
Anonymous child's prayer
Chapter 2 - Somewhere . . . between the living and the dead
Buffy stepped out of the untrimmed brush into a small clearing
that spread out at the base of an older, weather worn crypt. She
halted abruptly as she stared in front of her at the source of
the flickering illumination.
Seated on the rounded and cracked stone steps was a tall young
man, his face buried in his hands. His features had no physical
substance but their details shimmered in the night like the waving
flame of a lone candle. His long brown hair hung to his shoulders
and when he looked up his blue eyes pierced out into the darkness.
Buffy gasped as if she had just sunk Mr. Pointy into the vampire
chest of someone she knew and loved. She shivered and stepped
back for a second. Then a warmth washed over her, a feeling that
just three weeks ago she thought she had lost forever.
"Jonathan?" she whispered. The shade looked up and
stared around, but his gaze never fell directly on her.
"Buffy?" The word was almost inaudible.
The Slayer saw his lips move but his voice seemed to drift
faintly all around her as if it came from no specific direction
or location.
"Buffy? Is that you?"
"It's me!" Buffy wanted to shout it, scream it at
the night but her words jammed in her throat and came out as a
comical squeak.
"I can hardly hear you," Jonathan said as he searched
back and forth, "Where are you?" Buffy realized his
words didn't match the movement of his lips like there was a time
lag from the moment he spoke them until they reached her. She
imagined they must be crossing vast distances separating two universes
or realms of reality.
Buffy stepped closer. She could see his face more clearly.
It was pale, his hair disheveled and, with the exception of his
sharp blue eyes, his whole figure appeared virtually translucent.
She could also see his expression which cut to the quick of her
soul.
The impish grin was gone. The quizzical smile she remembered
from when he was totally clueless following the Scoobies through
the hallways of Sunnydale High, of that there was no trace either.
She had only seen this look on his face once before. It was the
time in the library when Willow found the fragmentary chronicle
on the internet relating the horrors of the plague outbreak in
the capital of the Holy Roman Empire. There he had struggled using
his telekinetic powers in a futile battle to hold back the ravages
of the disease in others until he himself finally fell as a victim.
Buffy had prayed that she would never have to gaze on that
expression again, that pain that reached across the centuries.
Now she had to do something. Slowly she approached the apparition
until she stood directly before him.
"Jonathan," she said mustering her Slayer's strength
for a challenge she had never faced, "You can't see me, can
you."
The flickering image stood up and shook his head. He glanced
back and forth, still trying to find the source of Buffy's voice.
"I'm right in front of you," she said softly, "Hold
out your hands."
Jonathan lifted his hands out with the palms up. Gently Buffy
placed hers on top of his. As she bent her fingers to embrace
his hands, her flesh passed silently into the formless apparition.
Buffy halted immediately. She felt a tingling in her fingers.
Jonathan instantly looked up at her.
"It is you!" he whispered, and Buffy saw the light
in his eyes. Hope, and her soul soared at what she felt.
"Hey, Couz," she replied as her eyes glistened.
"You're right here?" he asked as he stared unknowing
directly at her.
"Yeah," she replied as she bit her lip and tried
to hold back the flood of emotions. "Now bend down."
Slowly the apparition leaned forward. Buffy turned her face
up to meet him. Her lips brushed against his and she moved them
back and forth. Although there was no physical presence, she drank
in the tingling sensation as her lips passed through the flickering
light. She breathed in hard, drawing what she knew must be the
exhalations of his soul and then exhaled in a rush desperately
passing back hers to him across the vast emptiness separating
them.
The flickering shade of Jonathan Martel closed his eyes as
his lips moved back and forth matching the rhythm of hers. He
breathed in deeply at the same time. For a brief second he believed
he could see her form reaching out past the void, her face up
against his, her hands firmly grasping him. But the sensation
passed quickly.
Buffy opened her eyes and pulled her face back. The tingling
of her hands clasped in his suddenly vanished.
"Buffy?" he cried out.
"I'm still here!" she replied as firmly as she could.
"Jonathan, we're going to get you back! Where are you?"
"You have to help me!" he exclaimed, his voice trembling,
as if he hadn't heard her. "I'm trapped somewhere . . . somewhere
in between."
"I'm losing you!" Buffy shouted in a building panic
as she realized his form was now dissipating.
"I don't know where I am!" he continued and Buffy
could sense the desperation and despair from before, "It
changes from place to place! Now it's the cemetery, only I can't
see anyone!"
"Jonathan!" Buffy exclaimed, "You have to stay
with me! I'm going to help you! I promise! We're going to get
you back!"
And then Jonathan's words from out of the void separating them
caused Buffy to gasp and her mind freeze.
"I'm trapped in between, somewhere between the living
and the dead! You have to free me! You have to let me go! Drusilla
has. . ." suddenly his rapid flow of words became garbled
as the sound drifted.
"Drusilla! What about Drusilla?! Has she got you? What
is she doing to you?!" Buffy suddenly shouted. Her voice
rose in frustration at her inability to hear him, "Jonathan!
You've got to slow down! I can't understand you!"
Jonathan's voice ceased for a moment and then resumed, breaking
the silence.
"I love you, Buffy," the words though faint, were
clear.
"That I got," she replied slowly and said it even
though she knew he probably couldn't hear her, "Me, too.
I miss you so much."
"You must let me go," his voice whispered as his
head bowed under the weight of a pain Buffy couldn't even imagine.
Suddenly the faint light in the clearing before the crypt blinked
out.
"Jonathan? Jonathan!"
Darkness swept in around the Slayer. From their vantage point
back at Jenny Calender's grave, Giles and Xander heard voices
and saw the light vanish.
"Look! It's gone," the Watcher exclaimed.
"I say we send in the cavalry!" Xander shouted as
he dashed impulsively in the direction Buffy had taken. Both broke
into a run towards the crypt. Within seconds they crashed through
the thick brush.
They found Buffy standing alone, sharing the clearing with
only the shadows of the night and the ever present stones. Her
gaze rested on an empty spot at the foot of the worn steps.
"Are you all right?" Giles asked her gently.
"What was it, Buff?" Xander added without waiting
for the answer.
"He was here," the Slayer muttered at the darkness,
"It was Jonathan."
"What?" Xander replied, not quite certain that the
Slayer was entirely coherent.
"He was here, Giles," she said, at the same time
drawing in a deep breath, "I saw him. And he was trying to
tell me something about Drusilla."
"Are you sure it was Jonathan you saw, Buffy?" Giles
asked, his voice laced with skepticism, "This place can play
tricks on the mind, and that which appears before us may disguise
itself to be what we seek in our hearts."
"Giles! Jonathan was here!" the Slayer snapped, "He
was begging me to free him! Something about Drusilla holding him
prisoner. Could she do that?"
"I'm not sure I understand," Giles stammered as he
ran his hand through the curly hair across the top of his head.
"Giles," Buffy tried to explain and her voice rose
with her building emotions, "Jonathan said 'I'm trapped somewhere
between the living . . . and the dead!'"
"Easy, Buffy!" Xander said calmly as he placed his
hand on her shoulder. Buffy turned to him.
"We're going to find him," Xander firmly answered
the question in her glistening eyes. Silently, Xander offered
her every ounce of strength he could muster. It may have been
nothing in comparison to that endowed to a Slayer, but he was
letting her know it was hers. No matter what, it always would
be.
Buffy briefly placed her hand atop Xander's that was resting
on her shoulder.
"You're always here . . . at my side," she said sadly.
"I always will be," he answered her as he turned
to Giles, "G-man, we're gonna need some answers here."
"But, that can't be done," Giles muttered, now clearly
agitated, "No one knows the spells for reanimation. They've
been lost for centuries."
"That didn't stop Willow from materializing Jonathan back
in the library," Xander said, emphasizing what he thought
was the obvious.
"What are you babbling about Giles?" Buffy exclaimed,
"If it was spells, Jonathan knew them all!"
"It was the book . . . " Giles rambled on, still
running his hand through his hair, "Willow channeled the
book. The damn book they stole! His notebook!"
"Giles! What's going down here?" Buffy shouted trying
to attract her Watcher's attention.
"Jonathan! In the warehouse! How could I be so stupid!
Buffy! The warehouse . . . we must get there NOW!"
Giles spun immediately and burst in a sprint for the exit of
the cemetery. Buffy and Xander followed in pursuit, struggling
to keep up, but Giles remained well out in front, running faster
than they ever imagined he could.
* * * * * *
Giles' beat up Citroen, heading in the direction of rundown
industrial district, careened wildly through the streets of downtown
Sunnydale. Finally the clunky French automobile screeched to a
stop, skidding up against the curb with a slam in front of the
deserted warehouse where Buffy and Jonathan confronted Drusilla
and the Ancient One just three weeks ago. Giles leaped out and
scrambled towards the warehouse door with Xander and Buffy close
behind. Xander fumbled with a flashlight and struggled to direct
the light so as to illuminate the path before them.
Giles, his shadow dancing crazily in the flashlight beam, swept
up to the front of the building. Not even pausing to determine
whether the door was locked, he planted a furious kick mid level
on the wooden paneling, sending the door flying open on squealing
hinges. As he plunged inside, Xander quickly looked at Buffy.
"I thought that was your deal," he cracked.
"He taught it to me," Buffy replied as she followed
Giles inside.
Casting obstacles out of his way, Giles strode across
the wreckage on the main floor of the warehouse. He was making
for the doorway that led to the lower chamber where Drusilla had
set up the altar to raise up Yogsothoth. Buffy was right on his
coat tails and Xander, struggling to keep the flashlight beam
pointed directly ahead, floundered in last place.
"Giles!" she called out to him.
Her Watcher paid no attention as he reached the doorway to
the chamber and began the descent in darkness. Xander nervously
noted the once fresh corpse that had swung so freely beyond the
vampire's banquet table, hung there still, now shriveled in decay,
gently swinging on the edge of the shadows.
"Don't look," Buffy called over her shoulder.
"Too late!" Xander gagged as he attempted to redirect
his attention and the flashlight down the looming stairway.
"You're not gonna hurl are you?" Buffy asked nervously
as Xander hovered a little too close for comfort behind her as
they clomped down the metal stairs to the lower chamber after
Giles.
"The Xandman lose cookies!?" Xander answered as if
it were an insult, "No way! Nerves of steel! Stomach of iron!
Eat the cafeteria food everyday!"
"Good!" Buffy replied over the clattering of their
feet on the metal stairs, "I just remember that time you
ate all the hot dogs and cotton candy and then went on the Tilt-a-Whirl
with Willow and . . ."
"Shut up, Buffy!" Xander gagged again as the memory
brought on another digestive spasm.
At the bottom of the staircase, Giles forced open the heavy
lower chamber door. Scattered around were overturned chairs, broken
tables, trampled party streamers and the remnants of the altar
and the command stone that Jonathan smashed when he had destroyed
the Ancient One.
Without hesitation, Giles ran to the corner of the chamber
where Jonathan had finally died and his body had turned to dust.
Giles stopped and stared at the floor. Buffy and Xander finally
caught up with him.
"Giles! What's with the Sunnydale marathon?" Xander
half gasped and gagged at the same time as he struggled to rid
himself of the memory of the fateful Tilt-a-Whirl incident.
"We're too late," Giles announced, his voice hollow.
Buffy followed her Watcher's gaze to the point on the floor
where Jonathan's body turned to dust. She dreaded what she would
see, the light coating of dust spread across the concrete where
she had last held Jonathan in her arms. In surprise she suddenly
realized she felt nothing. She squinted in the wavering beam of
Xander's flashlight. The floor had been swept clean.
"I don't get it?" Xander quipped at the Slayer's
side, "Since when do vampires do house work?"
"That was her plan all along!" Giles moaned to himself
as he clenched his fists, "How could I have been so stupid
not to see it! This is the worst mistake I've ever made as a Watcher!"
"Giles! This is your Slayer calling," Buffy interrupted,
"You have to share what's going on here!"
"It's horrible in its simplicity and it's all my fault,"
Giles said in despair as he faced Buffy, "Drusilla destroyed
Jonathan, took his dust and reanimated his body and mind using
Jonathan's own spells from the second notebook. But what she did
not do was restore the third part of the equation, his soul! That's
what you saw in the cemetery!"
"Giles! Calm down!" Xander exclaimed, hoping to stop
Giles from revealing details that he was afraid would hurt Buffy
even more, "Let's just take a deep breath here, do something
very un-Sunnydale, be rational about this thing and . . ."
"No," Buffy said firmly as she held her hand up at
Xander to stop, "Giles, you have to tell me what the deal
is. The real deal."
"By eliminating the ethical restraint of the soul,"
Giles continued as clinically as possible, "Drusilla now
has control of Jonathan's body, his mind, his knowledge, his telekinetic
powers, all the incredible forces and spells that he had at his
command!"
Xander felt his stomach turn again.
"My God, she could reopen the Hellmouth!" Giles muttered
to the darkness around them, "She could accomplish what not
even the Master was able to do."
Buffy was silent as the impact of what had actually happened
that horrific night three weeks ago sank in.
"But Giles," Xander protested, "Jonathan would
never do anything . . ."
"It's not Jonathan, Xander! There's no soul!"
Buffy shuddered at the finality of Giles' words. She couldn't
think. She had promised she would help him, but she just couldn't
think. All she could see was the look in his eyes in those last
moments in the cemetery where he had begged her to save him from
. . .
. . . lost somewhere between the living and the dead . . .
she couldn't think. All she knew was she had promised to save
him.
"Giles . . .?" Buffy asked, fearing what she would
hear, "What do we have to do?"
She knew the answer. It was her lover's own words, "what
we have to do."
"Since we're probably too late to stop Drusilla from raising
Jonathan up, we must reverse the spells. We have no choice . .
." Giles answered slowly.
Buffy's eyes widened in anguish.
". . . we have to put him back down . . . we must destroy
him."
* * * * *
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