Bad Trip, Chapter 8
Apr. 2nd, 2004 02:22 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
thedeadlyhookWe now rejoin the adventures of the Scoobies, post BtVS Season 7, in progress. Goodbye to Montana, hello to the East Coast.
For those just joining our story, or wondering about this point, we are trying to keep more or less in line with BtVS/AtS canon... for this first section of the fic at least. I mention this only because in another chapter or so there may be a slight timing issue. Just saying.
ACT EIGHT: ALL FALL DOWN
In a hotel in Niagra Falls, New York, Xander Harris sat on the edge of a bed having a quiet nervous breakdown.
They'd been in the city for four days. Having rushed across country in a desperate attempt to intercept Buffy, they'd ended up stalled here, waiting for her to make her next move. If she and Dawn planned to go international, head to Europe for the next leg of their grand tour, they'd almost certainly cross back into the States from Canada, and head toward New York City. Confident that Niagra Falls was the best point to catch Buffy at the border, they'd camped out and settled in to wait.
And wait they did. The dilapidated hotel they'd chosen for their base camp had long since been explored completely, the local sights taken in. They'd mingled with the crowds tramping through the Falls area. They'd checked out all the museums and tourist traps. Anything to stay cheery, distracted. Anything to keep themselves from wondering when The First would strike at them next, and through who.
But that was getting harder and harder to do.
From his position on the bed, where he sat in an exhausted slump, Xander wearily surveyed his charges. All of the junior Slayers were bored, tense, tired. They'd taken to sleeping in shifts, pairing up to stay awake for hours on end while the others tried to get some restless sleep. But all of them were awake now. Bet and Graciela sat on the floor, far too close to the TV. Room service dishes littered the floor around them--they hadn't allowed the housekeeper in to clean. Too worried to risk some poor woman's life just for the luxury of fresh towels and sheets. Lo had taken over the table near the window and seemed completely absorbed in constructing an elaborate pyramid from their growing collection of discarded cola cans. Her hair was uncharacteristically limp--it hung in her face like a ragged curtain. Neena stood by the tall, mirror-topped dresser, methodically opening each drawer and folding and refolding the clothes inside.
Except for the blaring of the TV, it was painfully quiet. No one wanted to speak.
Xander knew he wasn't in much better shape. The car trip from Montana had been a grueling one. Once they'd realized that Kennedy or any of the girls could be taken over by The First at any time... well, that had reduced their pool of available drivers to two, himself and Willow. Even under normal conditions, Willow was a nervous, novice driver, who had barely squeaked through driver's ed and since relied on bumming rides from friends and family.
But these hadn't been normal conditions. Xander remembered the overturned big rigs, the mysteriously abandoned family sedans, the taped-off accident scenes that had grown ever more frequent as they made their way east. The inexplicable chasm that seemed to have opened up in the middle of the highway overnight. The plumes of smoke and wailing sirens that warned them away from Sioux Falls, Milwaukee, Columbus, Pittsburgh... And the biohazard warnings that blanketed the airwaves as they skirted Cleveland. Biohazard warnings! What the hell was that about?
Under the circumstances, he couldn't blame Willow for the way she clutched the steering wheel with rigid fingers, the jarring starts and stops as she reflexively tapped the brakes, her need for constant moral support from a watchful buddy in the shotgun seat. And that buddy pretty much had to be Xander, not just because he was the only one who could talk her out of white-knuckling the wheel as she drove, setting her at ease by flipping channels on the radio or making jokes, but because it had occurred to every single one of them just how easy it would be for someone in the passenger seat to reach over and grab the wheel, wrench the car into a fatal trajectory toward a tree, an overpass, a steep embankment. Better to have Xander there, cheery and upbeat. Reliable Xander, who couldn't be possessed.
And Reliable Xander had long since run out of energy. For all practical purposes, he'd been on constant duty since Three Forks. He'd eaten little, slept less. He felt light-headed, bone-tired, weary down to his last cell. It was worse, by far, than he'd felt right after the whole Sunnydale crisis. All he'd wanted to do then was sleep for days. Now sleep seemed like nothing more than a comforting but dimly remembered fairy tale. He couldn't rest, couldn't think straight, and there was no one to go to and ask to make things better. No Buffy. No Giles. Even Willow was so full of worry about Kennedy that she couldn't spare anything to help him. She needed him too, to reassure her that everything was going to be fine, eventually. Once they figured everything out, like they always did.
Until then, he'd have to be the strong one.
..........
"It seems so quiet here. So calm..."
"What?" Kennedy leaned closer, straining to hear Willow's musings over the rumble of the waterfalls.
"I said, IT SEEMS SO QUIET!" Willow gestured out beyond the safety railings, sweeping an arm to take in the river two hundred feet below, the sightseeing boats, the placid Canadian cityscape. "After all the craziness we saw on our way out here... Now that we're here, everything seems so normal, so calm."
"Yeah," Kennedy snorted, "the calm before the storm." She turned away from the cliff and regarded the viewing area behind them. Luna Island's small plaza was empty of tourists, and only the litter tangled in the surrounding bushes bore witness to their recent presence. "This place is dead, Willow. School's out for summer, but nobody's coming to play. Maybe they've got other things on their minds."
"What, like that ongoing collapse-of-civilization thing?" Willow heaved a sigh, remembering the chaos they'd glimpsed on the TV news over the last few days. "You know, I still keep hoping that somebody else is working this problem. That they're going to come up with an answer, and we'll be off the hook." Her expression brightened. "Hey, maybe Buffy's doing something about it!"
"Maybe she is," Kennedy answered dryly. "Whatever The First is using us Slayers for, I'm pretty sure it's bigger than just crushing heads and finger-painting in gore. Those symbols we've been seeing everywhere, on rocks and walls and stuff--you said they're for controlling people, right?"
"Controlling, influencing... Dominion over the land and its people, Bet said." Willow shuddered. "The mark of The First."
"And for all we know," Kennedy continued, "there could be hundreds more Slayers out there, thousands even, all over the world." She kicked contemplatively at the paved surface of the viewing plaza. "That's an awful lot of blood-smearing graffiti artists."
"And you think Buffy's one of them?" A look of sudden worry crossed Willow's face. "Oh god, Kennedy--do you think Dawnie's okay?"
Kennedy gave a tiny shrug. "I guess we'll find out soon enough. Speaking of which, I guess it's time for another magic show." She hoisted the tote bag they'd brought from the hotel, and wandered over to a patch of grass at the back of the plaza, where she began extracting the bag's contents--a folding map and an assortment of gems, jars, and knicknacks. Willow followed, settled down onto the grass, and they began arranging the components of the locator spell.
............
"My little brother used to watch this show," Graciela piped up, her voice cutting through the almost-silence with a suddenness that made everyone jump. Xander, who until that moment had been staring listlessly at the striped hotel carpet, shifted his gaze to the TV. Dragon Ball Z. The TV screen was lit with flashes of light, showing an apocalyptic cartoon battle in progress. Graciela seemed absorbed in this spectacle, entranced.
"He liked Vegeta," she added, eyes unmoving from the set.
There was an awkward pause. To date, Graciela had never talked about her family. The others had never asked her questions about them either, simply assuming that Graciela's situation must be similar to Bet's--that her family was dead, murdered by the Harbingers. It was the reason she couldn't go home. There was no one there to go to.
"That the one Andrew was always going on about?" Lo spoke up from her spot near the window. She'd stopped toying with her building project for the moment, and swiveled to face them, rolling a can slowly between her fingers.
Graciela nodded. "He used to be a bad guy. He came to Earth to kill everyone. Then he got beat, and he changed. Him and the good guys became friends. Later he got married, and had a kid. But he used to be evil." She paused. "Do you think we're evil?" she announced loudly, as if addressing the room, although her stare didn't budge from the TV.
Xander, who'd more or less tuned out during the story synopsis, blinked awake as if he'd been slapped. What the hell?
"Whoa, whoa. Hold it," he croaked, then took a deep breath to gather his energy. "Nobody's evil here. Trust me, when you grow up on top of a Hellmouth, you get a sense for these things. And you guys? Not setting off the detectors." He felt proud of the calm in his voice. "Uh, so, what makes you think you're evil?" he said evenly.
Graciela was silent. This time, it was Bet who spoke.
"That... stuff is in us," she whispered. "It could make us do things. Bad things." She dropped her head, rested her chin on her drawn-up knees. "Like Veronica Lin."
............
Sitting down next to Willow, Kennedy watched as she organized her props. "And then I just toss the powder and say my lines, right?" A gust of wind rustled the bushes, and Kennedy pressed a thumb to the edge of the map to keep it in place.
"Uh, just a second. You have to make sure the map's properly aligned first. North would be, um, thataway--just to the left of the Canada end of the Rainbow Bridge." Willow leaned forward and tugged at the map's corners, lining up the compass points with their real-world equivalents. Kennedy scooted back to give Willow some elbow room, and watched the calibration process with weary amusement.
"It's been a while since you've done this locator stuff with somebody else, huh," Kennedy commented as the final tweaks were completed.
"Yeah." Willow gave a wistful smile. "Not since Tara." She frowned for a moment. "Well, there was that one time with Anya, but that was kind of a desperation thing."
Kennedy raised an eyebrow. "Well, okay then. Wanna get started?" Upon Willow's go-ahead, she scooped a handful of colored dust out of its Tupperware carton and let it trickle down over the map. Referring to the index card in her other hand, Kennedy read off the incantation Willow had written down for her, and then the two women peered down to see the results of the locator spell.
Willow squinted at the constellation of tiny lights, quickly zeroing in on the largest and brightest of them. "Still in Toronto," she pronounced.
Kennedy sighed and straightened up into a more comfortable sitting position. It seemed like they'd spent most of the last two days running an endless series of short-range locator spells, repeatedly checking that Buffy hadn't yet begun moving towards the border. But with their target currently hunkered down in Toronto, just a couple of hours away, they couldn't afford to let their vigilance lapse; it would be too easy for Buffy to cross the Rainbow Bridge and slip right through the area before they even noticed she was in motion. And thus, round after round of locators it was.
"So I guess we just hurry up and wait, then," Kennedy said. She felt suddenly very tired. Was it the effects of the spell, or the anticipation, or just the accumulated toll of anxiety and sleep deprivation? Whichever, she thought. I don't know if I can take much more of this.
............
Back at the hotel, Xander was trying his best to reassure Graciela. "Hey, hey--nothing's going to happen to you, I promise." Where the heck are they getting this? From the TV? Maybe it really is a bad influence. "And even if it did, it's not your fault. It wouldn't be you doing it, it would be The First. And that makes it the bad guy, not you." There was something about this argument that bothered him, but he couldn't think what.
"But what about Veronica?" Graciela asked. "She killed people. That guy... in the alley. And the other ones, in the paper--that was probably her, too. And her parents..." Graciela broke off, her face twisting into a grimace. She might have been trying not to cry, but when she spoke again, she sounded angry, not sad.
"Veronica wrote a whole essay about being a Slayer and she didn't even know she was doing it," Graciela continued, voice tight with frustration. "She killed her own parents. She was... doing evil and probably thought--thought that she was doing g-good, killing monsters." She drew a shaky breath, or it might have been the start of a sob. "F-for all we know that's how it w-works. It makes you think you're doing what you're supposed to do. Makes you see things..."
"For all we know, we're doing something bad right now. How would we even know?" Bet added, her voice tiny. She looked painfully small, a pillow hugged up against her chest, her curly hair sticking out every which way.
This last seemed to fall into a well of silence. The entire room froze, considering this idea. We might be doing something bad right now. Neena stood statue-still by the bureau, a pair of socks clutched in her hands. Lo shifted uncomfortably in her seat near the window. Her foot jostled the table, and her carefully arranged pyramid of cans began to rain down on the table in a clatter of aluminum on wood-grain formica.
Graciela was sobbing hard now. Fat tears streamed down her cheeks. "I don't want to be evil" she cried. "I don't want to--to wake up someday and find out I've done awful things, and killed people."
Lo and Neena broke their paralysis, ran to her side, hovered over her, tried to comfort her, to gather her into a hug, but Graciela flinched away.
"I want to be good!" she shouted, shoving the words out through her tears. "I-I want to decide for myself! I don't want something to control me! I want people to like me, a-and... I don't want to be evil because something else says so! I never wanted any of this--" She broke off and covered her face with her arms to cry in loud howls.
Xander struggled to find something to say. What can I tell them? Don't worry? Everything will be okay? Somehow I don't think that's gonna cut it.
"Everything will be okay," he found himself saying in a sputtering rush, unable to think of anything better. "I promise you girls, everything will be okay. We'll figure this out. We always do."
............
After the locator lights winked out, Kennedy shrugged and began packing up the portable casting kit, while Willow stood up, stretched, brushed a few crumbs of dirt from the seat of her pants.
"Remind me again, Red," Kennedy said. "Why is it that, if you're the super-witch and I'm the monster-bashing muscle, I'm the one sprinkling powders and saying Abracadabra? I know you said it's kinda like a recipe, but c'mon. We're not just baking cakes here."
"Okay, not so much the baking analogy. But working magic, any kind of magic, takes energy. It's like physics--you can't create something from nothing." Willow winced apologetically. "And right now I've got nothing, so I'm having to put you guys to work. It's not wearing you down too much, is it? I'm trying to divvy up the chores between all of you..." Her voice trailed off, as she returned to the railings to take in Luna Island's scenic river view.
"Nah, it's cool. Always more where that came from." Kennedy finished stowing the spell components and levered herself to her feet. Despite her bravado, she was at the brink of exhaustion, and the last round of spellcasting had taken more out of her than she wanted to admit. Willow's face registered concern as Kennedy plodded over to join her.
"Are you sure? You look pretty beat." Willow reached out to stroke her cheek, but Kennedy pulled away. "And speaking of which, what's with the avoidy?" Kennedy retreated again as Willow stepped towards her. "I mean, I know we didn't exactly splurge on the honeymoon suite, but... Kennedy, you've hardly touched me since..."
"Since Montana." Kennedy finished Willow's sentence for her, and looked away, down into the cascading falls. "Willow, I just-- I just can't." She looked up again, and her eyes glistened with angry tears. "How can I, after what happened? Now that I know that, that thing can step into me any goddam time it feels like it? Make me hurt you, make me say things..."
"It's okay, baby." Willow moved closer to Kennedy, placing a soothing hand on her trembling shoulder. "It's going to be okay, I promise. We'll figure this out." She offered a sympathetic smile. "And, hey? Not exactly a stranger to the whole holding-back-the-evil-forces thing."
"It's not the same." Kennedy reached forward and wrapped her hands around the railings, which groaned in protest as her grip tightened. She turned her gaze back to the churning waters. "I've tried to be understanding and supportive and all that, but this thing of yours with the magic... I guess I just don't get it. For me, for the other girls, we're dealing with something that can take us over, make us do things. But your power, Willow... It comes from you. It's who you are." There was more than a hint of exasperation in her voice. "And right now, we could use all the help we can get."
Willow looked away, hurt. "I'm trying, Kennedy, I really am. But if I'm not ready, if I don't have the strength to control it... it could make things a lot worse. Like, end-of-the-world worse."
Kennedy laughed bitterly. "The world's already ending, babe, one day at a time. And I think we're about out of options." She released the rails, flexing her fingers. "You know, it's funny. This whole Slayer thing, fighting monsters, facing down an army of demons... I always knew I could handle it, I could deal. But this... this is kicking my ass."
She moved closer, gathered Willow in her arms, and gave a weary sigh. "I can't do this, Willow. Can't fight it, can't run from it... Can't sleep, can't think straight. Right now, you're all I've got."
Willow's voice was cracking. "Baby, I wish I could do something, I really do! It's killing me to see you like this, and not have the power to--"
"You've got the power, girl," Kennedy replied sadly. "But I guess you just don't have the will to use it." She thought back to their conversation in the van, in the parking lot of a Salinas shopping mall, when they'd pondered a demon's advice and held each other close.
How had the demon put it? The power to catch herself, Kennedy remembered, and to catch the others too. She let go of Willow, straightened herself with a shudder of determination. As Willow started in surprise, Kennedy grabbed the railing and vaulted over it in one smooth move, landing with a splash just short of where the rapids spilled over the cliff edge into the tumbling maelstrom of the American Falls. That's what the green guy said. Right after he told me to go with my gut.
Rising into a crouch as she braced herself against the rushing waters, Kennedy turned to look at Willow, who was trying to scramble over the railing after her, her desperate cries lost in the thunder of the waters. A couple of tourists were racing across the bridge to Luna Island, clearly bent on a macho rescue mission. She heard a boat tooting faintly behind her, two hundred feet below, where the cascading falls emptied into the river.
Go with my gut, he said. She smiled, suddenly sure of herself once more. The rising mist dampened her skin, plastered her hair. The roaring of the falls filled her ears. Famous last words.
Kennedy gave Willow a grin, and waggled one arm in a brief wave. "Catch me if you can, Red!"
And with that, she toppled backward over the cliff.
............
"Well, I guess it's time I cleared our path."
"What was that?" Dawn shot her sister a quizzical look.
"I said, I guess I could do with a nap." Buffy lay sprawled on a patch of grass, surveying the Toronto skyline. "Lunch was nice, but I'm feeling kinda drowsy all of a sudden. I think I'll just grab a few minutes of shut-eye before we get back on the road."
Dawn peered up at the slender 1,800-foot needle of the CN Tower, contemplating the revolving restaurant they'd just visited. "Hey, Buffy. What would happen if that restaurant sped up and started going faster and faster and faster?"
Buffy yawned, folding her arms beneath her head. "I guess everything would get pushed out to the edges, like in a washing machine. Except instead of dirty sheets and undies, think waiters and buffet carts. Faster and faster, until--squish!" She paused for a moment's reflection. "Unless the windows would break first. I don't know exactly."
"Oh." Dawn pouted. "I was thinking more along the lines of it spinning away like a flying saucer." She stood up and stretched. "So I guess I'll just, like, wander around a bit until you're ready to go."
"Uh-huh," Buffy agreed drowsily. As Dawn made her way across the lawn to the sidewalk, Buffy glanced one last time at the tower. Tallest building in the world, huh? We'll see how long that lasts. She visualized it toppling, slicing down across the city like the blade of a knife. Smoke trailed from the tower's flanks, tiny people leapt from the restaurant's shattered windows, as the needle fell in dreamy slow motion onto the burning ruins of Toronto.
Of course, she reflected as she slipped into sleep, there was no reason to think that would ever happen. No reason at all. But still, Buffy thought, it would really be something to see.
Its awareness unfurling like great wings, something moved towards Niagara Falls.
............
Okay, now that was impulsive, Kennedy thought. She could feel the spray of water, the rushing wind, and the initial rush of wild excitement began to curdle into fear. Oh crap, I blew it. Kennedy Douglass, this time you have really screwed the pooch.
She continued falling. She tried to tell herself it had been worth trying, that she'd had a good run, that she had no regrets, but she couldn't fool herself now. I'm not done. I want to live. Please, please, I want to take it back.
And then she thought, Hey, I'm taking a long time to hit bottom.
Kennedy cautiously opened her eyes. She was suspended in mid-air, dangling head down in front of the rushing waterfall. A dark figure slowly descended towards her, silhouetted against the sun. Though she could only see its outline, she could somehow sense the figure's eyes gazing down at her--two bottomless wells of pure black, which swallowed the light and allowed nothing to escape.
She heard Willow's voice, harsher and colder than the Willow she knew. "Kennedy," the figure said, "you are really pissing me off."
And Kennedy, floating in the air before the cascading waters, laughed with relief.
............
After maybe ten minutes of sobbing hysterics, Graciela collapsed into exhausted sleep on one of the suite's big double beds, curled up around Lo. Bet had returned her attention to the TV, relentlessly flipping channels past live news reports of unexplained murders and violence.
Xander retreated into the bathroom. He needed some time to think.
In the shower, he leaned his head against the cool tiles. He wanted to be strong for the girls--had to be--but this... The whole good versus evil argument. He was really out of his depth on that one.
But it had been on his mind too, ever since he'd had that visitation from The First. He could understand The First appearing as Spike--after all, if anyone had ever set off his alarm bells for walking, talking evil-right-here, it would have been Spike, world-saveage notwithstanding. But Jesse. And Anya.
He hadn't thought of Jesse in years, it seemed. Which was a pretty sad thing to say about someone who'd once been his best friend, every bit as much as Willow. And now he had to wonder... where Jesse was.
We're all in here, buddy. All of us who sleep in the earth.
Jesse had died a vampire. He'd been glad about it. Happy.
Did that mean he was in hell?
No, wait--those girls. It impersonated those Potentials. It can do anyone dead. That's what Giles said. Anyone. Not just... evil people.
It impersonated Buffy.
Maybe it's just the girls. Maybe it owns them somehow. Because they're Slayers. Maybe it's just in them.
But who else had it appeared as? Vampires, Slayers... and Anya was a demon for a thousand years.
We're all in here, buddy.
It couldn't be that simple. It had to be something else. Not just...
Anya was a good person. Whatever else she'd been, she was a good person. That has to count for something.
And then his thoughts were interrupted by the soft sound of fingers tapping on the shower cabinet's glass door.
For those just joining our story, or wondering about this point, we are trying to keep more or less in line with BtVS/AtS canon... for this first section of the fic at least. I mention this only because in another chapter or so there may be a slight timing issue. Just saying.
ACT EIGHT: ALL FALL DOWN
In a hotel in Niagra Falls, New York, Xander Harris sat on the edge of a bed having a quiet nervous breakdown.
They'd been in the city for four days. Having rushed across country in a desperate attempt to intercept Buffy, they'd ended up stalled here, waiting for her to make her next move. If she and Dawn planned to go international, head to Europe for the next leg of their grand tour, they'd almost certainly cross back into the States from Canada, and head toward New York City. Confident that Niagra Falls was the best point to catch Buffy at the border, they'd camped out and settled in to wait.
And wait they did. The dilapidated hotel they'd chosen for their base camp had long since been explored completely, the local sights taken in. They'd mingled with the crowds tramping through the Falls area. They'd checked out all the museums and tourist traps. Anything to stay cheery, distracted. Anything to keep themselves from wondering when The First would strike at them next, and through who.
But that was getting harder and harder to do.
From his position on the bed, where he sat in an exhausted slump, Xander wearily surveyed his charges. All of the junior Slayers were bored, tense, tired. They'd taken to sleeping in shifts, pairing up to stay awake for hours on end while the others tried to get some restless sleep. But all of them were awake now. Bet and Graciela sat on the floor, far too close to the TV. Room service dishes littered the floor around them--they hadn't allowed the housekeeper in to clean. Too worried to risk some poor woman's life just for the luxury of fresh towels and sheets. Lo had taken over the table near the window and seemed completely absorbed in constructing an elaborate pyramid from their growing collection of discarded cola cans. Her hair was uncharacteristically limp--it hung in her face like a ragged curtain. Neena stood by the tall, mirror-topped dresser, methodically opening each drawer and folding and refolding the clothes inside.
Except for the blaring of the TV, it was painfully quiet. No one wanted to speak.
Xander knew he wasn't in much better shape. The car trip from Montana had been a grueling one. Once they'd realized that Kennedy or any of the girls could be taken over by The First at any time... well, that had reduced their pool of available drivers to two, himself and Willow. Even under normal conditions, Willow was a nervous, novice driver, who had barely squeaked through driver's ed and since relied on bumming rides from friends and family.
But these hadn't been normal conditions. Xander remembered the overturned big rigs, the mysteriously abandoned family sedans, the taped-off accident scenes that had grown ever more frequent as they made their way east. The inexplicable chasm that seemed to have opened up in the middle of the highway overnight. The plumes of smoke and wailing sirens that warned them away from Sioux Falls, Milwaukee, Columbus, Pittsburgh... And the biohazard warnings that blanketed the airwaves as they skirted Cleveland. Biohazard warnings! What the hell was that about?
Under the circumstances, he couldn't blame Willow for the way she clutched the steering wheel with rigid fingers, the jarring starts and stops as she reflexively tapped the brakes, her need for constant moral support from a watchful buddy in the shotgun seat. And that buddy pretty much had to be Xander, not just because he was the only one who could talk her out of white-knuckling the wheel as she drove, setting her at ease by flipping channels on the radio or making jokes, but because it had occurred to every single one of them just how easy it would be for someone in the passenger seat to reach over and grab the wheel, wrench the car into a fatal trajectory toward a tree, an overpass, a steep embankment. Better to have Xander there, cheery and upbeat. Reliable Xander, who couldn't be possessed.
And Reliable Xander had long since run out of energy. For all practical purposes, he'd been on constant duty since Three Forks. He'd eaten little, slept less. He felt light-headed, bone-tired, weary down to his last cell. It was worse, by far, than he'd felt right after the whole Sunnydale crisis. All he'd wanted to do then was sleep for days. Now sleep seemed like nothing more than a comforting but dimly remembered fairy tale. He couldn't rest, couldn't think straight, and there was no one to go to and ask to make things better. No Buffy. No Giles. Even Willow was so full of worry about Kennedy that she couldn't spare anything to help him. She needed him too, to reassure her that everything was going to be fine, eventually. Once they figured everything out, like they always did.
Until then, he'd have to be the strong one.
..........
"It seems so quiet here. So calm..."
"What?" Kennedy leaned closer, straining to hear Willow's musings over the rumble of the waterfalls.
"I said, IT SEEMS SO QUIET!" Willow gestured out beyond the safety railings, sweeping an arm to take in the river two hundred feet below, the sightseeing boats, the placid Canadian cityscape. "After all the craziness we saw on our way out here... Now that we're here, everything seems so normal, so calm."
"Yeah," Kennedy snorted, "the calm before the storm." She turned away from the cliff and regarded the viewing area behind them. Luna Island's small plaza was empty of tourists, and only the litter tangled in the surrounding bushes bore witness to their recent presence. "This place is dead, Willow. School's out for summer, but nobody's coming to play. Maybe they've got other things on their minds."
"What, like that ongoing collapse-of-civilization thing?" Willow heaved a sigh, remembering the chaos they'd glimpsed on the TV news over the last few days. "You know, I still keep hoping that somebody else is working this problem. That they're going to come up with an answer, and we'll be off the hook." Her expression brightened. "Hey, maybe Buffy's doing something about it!"
"Maybe she is," Kennedy answered dryly. "Whatever The First is using us Slayers for, I'm pretty sure it's bigger than just crushing heads and finger-painting in gore. Those symbols we've been seeing everywhere, on rocks and walls and stuff--you said they're for controlling people, right?"
"Controlling, influencing... Dominion over the land and its people, Bet said." Willow shuddered. "The mark of The First."
"And for all we know," Kennedy continued, "there could be hundreds more Slayers out there, thousands even, all over the world." She kicked contemplatively at the paved surface of the viewing plaza. "That's an awful lot of blood-smearing graffiti artists."
"And you think Buffy's one of them?" A look of sudden worry crossed Willow's face. "Oh god, Kennedy--do you think Dawnie's okay?"
Kennedy gave a tiny shrug. "I guess we'll find out soon enough. Speaking of which, I guess it's time for another magic show." She hoisted the tote bag they'd brought from the hotel, and wandered over to a patch of grass at the back of the plaza, where she began extracting the bag's contents--a folding map and an assortment of gems, jars, and knicknacks. Willow followed, settled down onto the grass, and they began arranging the components of the locator spell.
............
"My little brother used to watch this show," Graciela piped up, her voice cutting through the almost-silence with a suddenness that made everyone jump. Xander, who until that moment had been staring listlessly at the striped hotel carpet, shifted his gaze to the TV. Dragon Ball Z. The TV screen was lit with flashes of light, showing an apocalyptic cartoon battle in progress. Graciela seemed absorbed in this spectacle, entranced.
"He liked Vegeta," she added, eyes unmoving from the set.
There was an awkward pause. To date, Graciela had never talked about her family. The others had never asked her questions about them either, simply assuming that Graciela's situation must be similar to Bet's--that her family was dead, murdered by the Harbingers. It was the reason she couldn't go home. There was no one there to go to.
"That the one Andrew was always going on about?" Lo spoke up from her spot near the window. She'd stopped toying with her building project for the moment, and swiveled to face them, rolling a can slowly between her fingers.
Graciela nodded. "He used to be a bad guy. He came to Earth to kill everyone. Then he got beat, and he changed. Him and the good guys became friends. Later he got married, and had a kid. But he used to be evil." She paused. "Do you think we're evil?" she announced loudly, as if addressing the room, although her stare didn't budge from the TV.
Xander, who'd more or less tuned out during the story synopsis, blinked awake as if he'd been slapped. What the hell?
"Whoa, whoa. Hold it," he croaked, then took a deep breath to gather his energy. "Nobody's evil here. Trust me, when you grow up on top of a Hellmouth, you get a sense for these things. And you guys? Not setting off the detectors." He felt proud of the calm in his voice. "Uh, so, what makes you think you're evil?" he said evenly.
Graciela was silent. This time, it was Bet who spoke.
"That... stuff is in us," she whispered. "It could make us do things. Bad things." She dropped her head, rested her chin on her drawn-up knees. "Like Veronica Lin."
............
Sitting down next to Willow, Kennedy watched as she organized her props. "And then I just toss the powder and say my lines, right?" A gust of wind rustled the bushes, and Kennedy pressed a thumb to the edge of the map to keep it in place.
"Uh, just a second. You have to make sure the map's properly aligned first. North would be, um, thataway--just to the left of the Canada end of the Rainbow Bridge." Willow leaned forward and tugged at the map's corners, lining up the compass points with their real-world equivalents. Kennedy scooted back to give Willow some elbow room, and watched the calibration process with weary amusement.
"It's been a while since you've done this locator stuff with somebody else, huh," Kennedy commented as the final tweaks were completed.
"Yeah." Willow gave a wistful smile. "Not since Tara." She frowned for a moment. "Well, there was that one time with Anya, but that was kind of a desperation thing."
Kennedy raised an eyebrow. "Well, okay then. Wanna get started?" Upon Willow's go-ahead, she scooped a handful of colored dust out of its Tupperware carton and let it trickle down over the map. Referring to the index card in her other hand, Kennedy read off the incantation Willow had written down for her, and then the two women peered down to see the results of the locator spell.
Willow squinted at the constellation of tiny lights, quickly zeroing in on the largest and brightest of them. "Still in Toronto," she pronounced.
Kennedy sighed and straightened up into a more comfortable sitting position. It seemed like they'd spent most of the last two days running an endless series of short-range locator spells, repeatedly checking that Buffy hadn't yet begun moving towards the border. But with their target currently hunkered down in Toronto, just a couple of hours away, they couldn't afford to let their vigilance lapse; it would be too easy for Buffy to cross the Rainbow Bridge and slip right through the area before they even noticed she was in motion. And thus, round after round of locators it was.
"So I guess we just hurry up and wait, then," Kennedy said. She felt suddenly very tired. Was it the effects of the spell, or the anticipation, or just the accumulated toll of anxiety and sleep deprivation? Whichever, she thought. I don't know if I can take much more of this.
............
Back at the hotel, Xander was trying his best to reassure Graciela. "Hey, hey--nothing's going to happen to you, I promise." Where the heck are they getting this? From the TV? Maybe it really is a bad influence. "And even if it did, it's not your fault. It wouldn't be you doing it, it would be The First. And that makes it the bad guy, not you." There was something about this argument that bothered him, but he couldn't think what.
"But what about Veronica?" Graciela asked. "She killed people. That guy... in the alley. And the other ones, in the paper--that was probably her, too. And her parents..." Graciela broke off, her face twisting into a grimace. She might have been trying not to cry, but when she spoke again, she sounded angry, not sad.
"Veronica wrote a whole essay about being a Slayer and she didn't even know she was doing it," Graciela continued, voice tight with frustration. "She killed her own parents. She was... doing evil and probably thought--thought that she was doing g-good, killing monsters." She drew a shaky breath, or it might have been the start of a sob. "F-for all we know that's how it w-works. It makes you think you're doing what you're supposed to do. Makes you see things..."
"For all we know, we're doing something bad right now. How would we even know?" Bet added, her voice tiny. She looked painfully small, a pillow hugged up against her chest, her curly hair sticking out every which way.
This last seemed to fall into a well of silence. The entire room froze, considering this idea. We might be doing something bad right now. Neena stood statue-still by the bureau, a pair of socks clutched in her hands. Lo shifted uncomfortably in her seat near the window. Her foot jostled the table, and her carefully arranged pyramid of cans began to rain down on the table in a clatter of aluminum on wood-grain formica.
Graciela was sobbing hard now. Fat tears streamed down her cheeks. "I don't want to be evil" she cried. "I don't want to--to wake up someday and find out I've done awful things, and killed people."
Lo and Neena broke their paralysis, ran to her side, hovered over her, tried to comfort her, to gather her into a hug, but Graciela flinched away.
"I want to be good!" she shouted, shoving the words out through her tears. "I-I want to decide for myself! I don't want something to control me! I want people to like me, a-and... I don't want to be evil because something else says so! I never wanted any of this--" She broke off and covered her face with her arms to cry in loud howls.
Xander struggled to find something to say. What can I tell them? Don't worry? Everything will be okay? Somehow I don't think that's gonna cut it.
"Everything will be okay," he found himself saying in a sputtering rush, unable to think of anything better. "I promise you girls, everything will be okay. We'll figure this out. We always do."
............
After the locator lights winked out, Kennedy shrugged and began packing up the portable casting kit, while Willow stood up, stretched, brushed a few crumbs of dirt from the seat of her pants.
"Remind me again, Red," Kennedy said. "Why is it that, if you're the super-witch and I'm the monster-bashing muscle, I'm the one sprinkling powders and saying Abracadabra? I know you said it's kinda like a recipe, but c'mon. We're not just baking cakes here."
"Okay, not so much the baking analogy. But working magic, any kind of magic, takes energy. It's like physics--you can't create something from nothing." Willow winced apologetically. "And right now I've got nothing, so I'm having to put you guys to work. It's not wearing you down too much, is it? I'm trying to divvy up the chores between all of you..." Her voice trailed off, as she returned to the railings to take in Luna Island's scenic river view.
"Nah, it's cool. Always more where that came from." Kennedy finished stowing the spell components and levered herself to her feet. Despite her bravado, she was at the brink of exhaustion, and the last round of spellcasting had taken more out of her than she wanted to admit. Willow's face registered concern as Kennedy plodded over to join her.
"Are you sure? You look pretty beat." Willow reached out to stroke her cheek, but Kennedy pulled away. "And speaking of which, what's with the avoidy?" Kennedy retreated again as Willow stepped towards her. "I mean, I know we didn't exactly splurge on the honeymoon suite, but... Kennedy, you've hardly touched me since..."
"Since Montana." Kennedy finished Willow's sentence for her, and looked away, down into the cascading falls. "Willow, I just-- I just can't." She looked up again, and her eyes glistened with angry tears. "How can I, after what happened? Now that I know that, that thing can step into me any goddam time it feels like it? Make me hurt you, make me say things..."
"It's okay, baby." Willow moved closer to Kennedy, placing a soothing hand on her trembling shoulder. "It's going to be okay, I promise. We'll figure this out." She offered a sympathetic smile. "And, hey? Not exactly a stranger to the whole holding-back-the-evil-forces thing."
"It's not the same." Kennedy reached forward and wrapped her hands around the railings, which groaned in protest as her grip tightened. She turned her gaze back to the churning waters. "I've tried to be understanding and supportive and all that, but this thing of yours with the magic... I guess I just don't get it. For me, for the other girls, we're dealing with something that can take us over, make us do things. But your power, Willow... It comes from you. It's who you are." There was more than a hint of exasperation in her voice. "And right now, we could use all the help we can get."
Willow looked away, hurt. "I'm trying, Kennedy, I really am. But if I'm not ready, if I don't have the strength to control it... it could make things a lot worse. Like, end-of-the-world worse."
Kennedy laughed bitterly. "The world's already ending, babe, one day at a time. And I think we're about out of options." She released the rails, flexing her fingers. "You know, it's funny. This whole Slayer thing, fighting monsters, facing down an army of demons... I always knew I could handle it, I could deal. But this... this is kicking my ass."
She moved closer, gathered Willow in her arms, and gave a weary sigh. "I can't do this, Willow. Can't fight it, can't run from it... Can't sleep, can't think straight. Right now, you're all I've got."
Willow's voice was cracking. "Baby, I wish I could do something, I really do! It's killing me to see you like this, and not have the power to--"
"You've got the power, girl," Kennedy replied sadly. "But I guess you just don't have the will to use it." She thought back to their conversation in the van, in the parking lot of a Salinas shopping mall, when they'd pondered a demon's advice and held each other close.
How had the demon put it? The power to catch herself, Kennedy remembered, and to catch the others too. She let go of Willow, straightened herself with a shudder of determination. As Willow started in surprise, Kennedy grabbed the railing and vaulted over it in one smooth move, landing with a splash just short of where the rapids spilled over the cliff edge into the tumbling maelstrom of the American Falls. That's what the green guy said. Right after he told me to go with my gut.
Rising into a crouch as she braced herself against the rushing waters, Kennedy turned to look at Willow, who was trying to scramble over the railing after her, her desperate cries lost in the thunder of the waters. A couple of tourists were racing across the bridge to Luna Island, clearly bent on a macho rescue mission. She heard a boat tooting faintly behind her, two hundred feet below, where the cascading falls emptied into the river.
Go with my gut, he said. She smiled, suddenly sure of herself once more. The rising mist dampened her skin, plastered her hair. The roaring of the falls filled her ears. Famous last words.
Kennedy gave Willow a grin, and waggled one arm in a brief wave. "Catch me if you can, Red!"
And with that, she toppled backward over the cliff.
............
"Well, I guess it's time I cleared our path."
"What was that?" Dawn shot her sister a quizzical look.
"I said, I guess I could do with a nap." Buffy lay sprawled on a patch of grass, surveying the Toronto skyline. "Lunch was nice, but I'm feeling kinda drowsy all of a sudden. I think I'll just grab a few minutes of shut-eye before we get back on the road."
Dawn peered up at the slender 1,800-foot needle of the CN Tower, contemplating the revolving restaurant they'd just visited. "Hey, Buffy. What would happen if that restaurant sped up and started going faster and faster and faster?"
Buffy yawned, folding her arms beneath her head. "I guess everything would get pushed out to the edges, like in a washing machine. Except instead of dirty sheets and undies, think waiters and buffet carts. Faster and faster, until--squish!" She paused for a moment's reflection. "Unless the windows would break first. I don't know exactly."
"Oh." Dawn pouted. "I was thinking more along the lines of it spinning away like a flying saucer." She stood up and stretched. "So I guess I'll just, like, wander around a bit until you're ready to go."
"Uh-huh," Buffy agreed drowsily. As Dawn made her way across the lawn to the sidewalk, Buffy glanced one last time at the tower. Tallest building in the world, huh? We'll see how long that lasts. She visualized it toppling, slicing down across the city like the blade of a knife. Smoke trailed from the tower's flanks, tiny people leapt from the restaurant's shattered windows, as the needle fell in dreamy slow motion onto the burning ruins of Toronto.
Of course, she reflected as she slipped into sleep, there was no reason to think that would ever happen. No reason at all. But still, Buffy thought, it would really be something to see.
Its awareness unfurling like great wings, something moved towards Niagara Falls.
............
Okay, now that was impulsive, Kennedy thought. She could feel the spray of water, the rushing wind, and the initial rush of wild excitement began to curdle into fear. Oh crap, I blew it. Kennedy Douglass, this time you have really screwed the pooch.
She continued falling. She tried to tell herself it had been worth trying, that she'd had a good run, that she had no regrets, but she couldn't fool herself now. I'm not done. I want to live. Please, please, I want to take it back.
And then she thought, Hey, I'm taking a long time to hit bottom.
Kennedy cautiously opened her eyes. She was suspended in mid-air, dangling head down in front of the rushing waterfall. A dark figure slowly descended towards her, silhouetted against the sun. Though she could only see its outline, she could somehow sense the figure's eyes gazing down at her--two bottomless wells of pure black, which swallowed the light and allowed nothing to escape.
She heard Willow's voice, harsher and colder than the Willow she knew. "Kennedy," the figure said, "you are really pissing me off."
And Kennedy, floating in the air before the cascading waters, laughed with relief.
............
After maybe ten minutes of sobbing hysterics, Graciela collapsed into exhausted sleep on one of the suite's big double beds, curled up around Lo. Bet had returned her attention to the TV, relentlessly flipping channels past live news reports of unexplained murders and violence.
Xander retreated into the bathroom. He needed some time to think.
In the shower, he leaned his head against the cool tiles. He wanted to be strong for the girls--had to be--but this... The whole good versus evil argument. He was really out of his depth on that one.
But it had been on his mind too, ever since he'd had that visitation from The First. He could understand The First appearing as Spike--after all, if anyone had ever set off his alarm bells for walking, talking evil-right-here, it would have been Spike, world-saveage notwithstanding. But Jesse. And Anya.
He hadn't thought of Jesse in years, it seemed. Which was a pretty sad thing to say about someone who'd once been his best friend, every bit as much as Willow. And now he had to wonder... where Jesse was.
We're all in here, buddy. All of us who sleep in the earth.
Jesse had died a vampire. He'd been glad about it. Happy.
Did that mean he was in hell?
No, wait--those girls. It impersonated those Potentials. It can do anyone dead. That's what Giles said. Anyone. Not just... evil people.
It impersonated Buffy.
Maybe it's just the girls. Maybe it owns them somehow. Because they're Slayers. Maybe it's just in them.
But who else had it appeared as? Vampires, Slayers... and Anya was a demon for a thousand years.
We're all in here, buddy.
It couldn't be that simple. It had to be something else. Not just...
Anya was a good person. Whatever else she'd been, she was a good person. That has to count for something.
And then his thoughts were interrupted by the soft sound of fingers tapping on the shower cabinet's glass door.