Sunnydale, California, Early May 2003 (The Next Day/Tuesday Fandom Time)
The good: Caleb was dead. Buffy had cut him in half with the shiny new thing she was calling a Scythe, and even though Kennedy wanted to go full-on weapons geek and argue terminology now wasn't the time. She'd also come back from her excursion with two key things: information on the Scythe (forged forever ago by a group of women working separately from the Watchers' Council, made for the Slayer, probably key to everything here, which... okay then) and a giant, gaudy amulet.
The amulet was in Spike's hands now, and Kennedy couldn't help hoping that this meant good things for him. She'd gotten to really like the guy.
...not that she got how the amulet was supposed to help them, exactly, just that Buffy had gotten it from Angel, who wasn't really clear on the translation of what it was supposed to do. (Kennedy was willing to bet Wesley had had a hand in that, but what did she know, really?)
The bad: the biggest fight of their lives was staring them in the face, and the fate of the world might hinge on their success. Really big gamble, based on what little concrete information they had.
Still. This was it, and everyone was gathered in the living room to hear Buffy speak.
Buffy
Buffy knew that her speechifying had put a lot of people off. Or, all the people. But today, everyone gathered in her living room was going to have to listen to it again, and this time they better be paying attention.
"I hate this," she said, moving through the tightly-packed crowd so they could all see her. "I hate being here. I hate that you have to be here. I hate that there's evil, that it's growing, and I hate that I was chosen to fight it. I wish, a whole lot of the time, that I hadn't been." She smiled wryly. "I know a lot of you wish I hadn't been, either."
Deny it, girls. Dare you to.
"But this isn't about wishes. This is about choices. I never had one. I was chosen. And I accept that." Much as it sucked so extremely hard sometimes. "I'm not asking you to accept anything. I'm asking you to make your own choice. I believe we can beat this evil- not when it comes, not after its army is ready, but now.
"Tomorrow morning I'm opening the Seal," Buffy continued. "I'm going down into the Hellmouth and I'm going to finish it once and for all. I've got strong allies: warriors, charms, sorcerers, and I'll need them all. But I'll also need you. Every single one of you. So now you're asking yourself, 'What makes this different? What makes us anything more than a bunch of girls getting picked off one by one?' It's true none of you has the power Faith and I have. I think both of us would have to die for a new Slayer to be called, and we can't even be sure that girl is in this room. That's the rule." Plus Buffy'd already died twice, it got old kinda fast. One of these times she was bound to not come back from it.
"So here's the part where you make a choice. What if you could have that power? Now. All of you. In every generation one Slayer is born because a bunch of guys that died thousands of years ago made up that rule. They were powerful men." Buffy raised her arm, pointing to Willow. "This woman is more powerful than all of them combined."
No pressure, Will.
"So I say we change the rules. I say my power should be our power. Tomorrow Willow will use the essence of this scythe," she said, picking it up and holding it for them to see, "that contains the energy and history of so many Slayers, to change our destiny. From now on, every girl in the world who might be a Slayer, will be a Slayer. Every girl who could have the power, will have the power. Who can stand up, will stand up. Every one of you, and girls we've never known, and generations to come... they will have strength they never dreamed of, and more than that, they will have each other. Slayers. Every one of us."
It amazed even her that she could go on that long sometimes. Fact was, though, she meant every single word of it, and she hoped they all knew it. And that they trusted her enough.
"Make your choice. Are you ready to be strong?"
***
No one was sleeping tonight, that much was for sure. Nerves, excitement, the desperate urge to puke, whatever; tomorrow morning they'd be taking the fight right to the First.
Right to the incorporeal evil.
Kennedy had spent most of the day upstairs with Willow, just sticking around to be supportive girl while Willow went over notes and research, but after a while she couldn't sit still any more and excused herself to take a walk through the house.
Still seizing the day, like Drake had said. She had never done regrets, and she wasn't about to start now, so... time to talk to everyone just in case it might be the last time.
Spike
Spike could only spend so long in the basement, staring at the bloody Liz Taylor champion pendant until he just about expected it to tap dance.
He suspected later he'd find the Slayer (and in his head, Buffy would always be the Slayer, even if soon there would be a couple thousand other girls with the same claim), or she'd find him, and they'd ... do whatever it was they were doing these days. But for now, he'd be out on the porch, getting some nice fresh air and polluting it with his cigarette. Wasn't like the air quality made so much difference to him, either way.
The pendant was in his jacket pocket, and every few seconds he'd run a thumb over the stone just to make sure it hadn't vanished. Him, a champion.
The world was very strange indeed.
Kennedy
When Kennedy spotted him through the window, she slipped out onto the porch, shut the door behind her, and leaned against it with her thumbs in her pockets.
"Y'know, there's supposed to be a law in this state about doing that at least fifteen feet away from doorways."
It was an awkward attempt at Scooby humor in the face of doom, granted, but she had to open somehow.
Spike
"Is there," Spike said, finishing his drag before he stubbed the cigarette out on the railing. "Somehow I don't think a patrol car's gonna happen to cite me for it tonight."
What with how the entire population of Sunnydale had fled in a panic, and such.
He looked over to Kennedy. "How's Red holding up?"
Kennedy
"Well, didn't you just luck out, then?" Kennedy glanced down Revello Drive, completely, totally, and freakishly in the dark except for the faint candlelight glow from inside the house. They'd be able to see-- and hear, with the absolute quiet-- any headlights that might pull down the street, and there wouldn't be any of those coming.
Not that there was anything they could do about that with the power company (and everyone else, of course) AWOL. Not that it helped people's nerves, though.
She took a breath. "She's freaking a little, I think." Or a lot, but now was not the time for Kennedy to say anything that might be construed as slander, and miraculously she actually realized it. "Can't really blame her, all things considered."
Spike
Spike nodded slowly, taking that in. "I'd be more worried about her if she wasn't," he said. "And the girls, are you all ready and eager for the shiny power upgrade?"
He was being dismissive, he knew it. But sometimes it was the only way to handle the really big stuff.
Kennedy
"Can't speak for everyone, but me?" Kennedy spread her hands. "Hey, bring it. No more could-be might-be if-you-hold-your-breath stuff. Hell, I've been ready for this my whole life."
Despite the words, she wasn't quite as exuberant as might have been expected. Willow's nervousness and the weight of everyone else's anticipation: those were contagious.
"How 'bout you? You set for... whatever it is you're gonna do?"
Spike
Spike plucked the medallion out of his pocket, held it aloft to see it glitter dimly in the candlelight and starlight.
"Figure once this is over, I can auction the bauble off and be set for a few decades," he said. "Funny. All those years trying to kill the slayer, never would have thought she'd end up picking me for a Champion."
He twirled the medallion a bit more. "Long strange road for both of us."
He wasn't ready. At the same time, it felt inevitable. Spike wasn't a patient vampire at the best of times, and the wait for morning was all but unbearable.
Kennedy
Especially with him being nocturnal and all...
Oh, right, because anyone else was going to be sleeping.
She'd said she was rooting for him, and Kennedy moved over to perch on the porch railing, then mimed shaking a pair of pom-poms at him.
"Yay for the unexpected, I guess?" She peered at the medallion. "Wouldn't really have picked that as your kinda style, gotta say."
Spike
Spike smirked at that. You couldn't go so far as to call it a smile.
"Yeah? I think it sets off the leather perfectly."
Kennedy
"Hey." Kennedy clicked her tongue stud against her teeth loudly. "If you're gonna go the jewelry route, might as well go all out, but you really might wanna think about this one."
Spike
"Maybe." Spike twirled it again. "You know, it's Angel's fault. Git's dim enough to have picked out the shiniest style he could find."
A little sire-slandering always helped to pass the time.
Kennedy
Kennedy could appreciate that.
"Goes with the whole Champion thing," she offered. "Kinda like a Super Bowl ring."
She took a breath. "I lied, earlier. It suits you."
The Champion thing, not the giant gaudy bauble, but she hoped he knew what she meant.
Spike
"I just said, it's the poof's taste, not --"
Spike was irritated, or mock-irritated, enough that it took him a moment to realize what Kennedy meant. When he did, he softened and almost smiled again.
"I hope it will," he said simply. "And the hero gig's gonna look good on you, too."
Kennedy
Kennedy could've said something flippant about not getting weepy, this wasn't a Lifetime movie or one of Spike's soap operas, but--
She just nodded once. "Hope it does. Kinda figures, huh? Right when I gave up on that ever happening." A beat. "If not, I totally expect you to make fun of me for it later."
Spike
"I'm not planning on going anywhere."
Even though he was getting the feeling he might have to. Sometimes the champion slayed the dragon; sometimes things went the other way around. But that wasn't a thought to frighten baby slayers with.
Kennedy
"Good." And that was a look of gratitude, because the possibility of any of them not making it through the next morning had not eluded Kennedy's thoughts, but she got it now, how sometimes talking about these things was the vastly less-fun alternative. "'cause you've got practice at it now, and I'd hate to have to find a replacement."
She kicked her heels idly against the porch railing for a few seconds, feeling the vibrations coming up through her hands. This might threaten to get maudlin, and nobody needed that.
"Good luck, yeah?"
Spike
"Same to you," Spike said, and finally stowed the gem back in his pocket. This conversation showed all the signs of going decidedly maudlin if it wasn't ended now, and maudlin wasn't how Spike wanted to spend what could be the last night of either of their lives.
He took on a final tone when he next spoke, though not an unkind one.
"Now, you probably still need to get ready, and I have important ... champion ... brooding in the basement to do."
Besides. He really wanted to see Buffy.
Kennedy
And Kennedy wanted to get back upstairs to Willow, so they were kind of on the same page there.
"Can't stand in the way of that," she agreed as she stepped out of the way of the front door. "Go on, brood in style."
She figured she was as ready as she was going to get. The rest was just waiting.
Faith
Faith couldn't stop pacing tonight. The bleach-blond vampire was on the porch, so she'd taken to prowling the front sidewalk.
Some of it was the upcoming fight. Some of it was waking up again. First the coma, then the mystical mind-shit with Angel, and then being knocked out for a day or two after that fucking bomb the Bringers had planted special for them.
She hated losing time. Slayer meant you died early, everybody knew it, and that didn't bother her because she never figured anything else for herself, but losing big chunks of it from the middle, somehow that didn't seem fair. Like someone snuck up behind you and stole change out of your pockets.
She wanted to be awake right now. Had to stay awake right now. If she went down tomorrow in this apocalypse shit, she wouldn't want to have spent tonight asleep.
Kennedy
The concussion-like parts had to be a bitch, too.
Kennedy had meant to go back inside after talking to Spike, but she did owe Faith that apology, after all, and now seemed as good a time as any to give it, so when she realized who was out there on the sidewalk she drifted that way instead.
"Hey. Sleep not happening for you either, huh?"
Faith
"Hey," Faith said, ducking her head and acknowledging the other girl. "Don't wanna sleep. Kinda ... got too much inside right now. Couldn't sleep if I wanted to."
She folded her arms, glad she'd had a moment to say this. Especially since they might all die tomorrow, in which case ... actually, in that case it really wouldn't fucking matter anyway, would it?
"I heard you kicked ass back there," she said.
Kennedy
She could've bragged about it, and maybe she had a right to, but they'd come home without four of the girls including Bryn, whom Kennedy had been working with extensively the past week since she'd turned out to be really promising with a crossbow. It put a damper on wanting to pat herself on the back.
Instead, Kennedy just nodded once, briefly. "Someone had to get 'em out as alive as possible. Which..." She frowned in the darkness, took a breath. "Kinda blows, pressure-wise. I sort of get that now."
Not quite an apology, not yet. She was working her way up to that.
Faith
"Not the most fun I've had," Faith agreed with a sigh. "I don't think Slayers do 'meek.' The First is trying to enslave humanity, morale sucks, and I just lost some of our girls to a bullshit trap. Not my best outing."
Which sounded like bullshit self-pity, so she took a breath, blew it out, and waved the thought away.
"It's not important. Look. You were in a bad situation, everyone's injured, everyone's panicking. Someone had to take charge, herd everyone out of there, get the wounded, and get the fuck out of Dodge. And you stepped up like a pro. You guys even tried to take down one of those ubervamps." She shrugged. "I'm just saying. Don't sell yourself short."
Which marked what was possibly the first time anyone ever said that to Kennedy with a straight face.
Kennedy
That was entirely possible. There was an incredibly good chance of it, actually; mostly, lectures on her opinion of herself tended to warn her to tone it the hell down.
Thus the look of genuine surprise on Kennedy's face, followed by the closest thing to a self-deprecating half-smile that anyone had gotten out of her in a long time.
"I didn't know what else to do," she admitted. "Gotta say it scared the shit out of me even more than the whole bait thing did."
Faith
"Scared the shit out of me, too," Faith said. Hey, speaking of unexpected vulnerabilities. "Not that night, I mean, I was out cold and all. But ... being in charge. Trying not to fuck up, making shit up as I went along, hoping people took me seriously. Sorry if I came down a little hard on you, Boarding School."
Kennedy may not be the only person she had been unfair to lately, her brain wanted to insist, but that was crap and it should shut up already.
Kennedy
"'s all good." Kennedy let out a little laugh. "Most people think I deserve that... not sure they're really wrong. But y'know, you scared the shit out of me that night, being out cold."
It really, really had.
"Kinda funny, huh? First you tell me if you get taken out, I might be the next one in line, and then all that shit goes down and all I can think is I really don't want it if it's gonna happen like that."
Faith
"I was just shooting my mouth off," Faith said, fidgeting awkwardly and glancing away. "You shouldn't listen to me. I get taken out, it's just my time, that's all. I'm probably overdue."
This could be her last night, ever, and she wasn't smoking. She wasn't shooting heroin, or drunk off her ass. She wasn't getting laid, because that got messy last time, and now it was all complicated. So instead she was here thinking about shit and possibly wasting her last hours ever not getting stoned or fucked. Smart thinking, Faith.
"B pulls this off, it may not have to go down like that," she mused, leaning back against the porch railing.
It was a good night to stare up at the sky. There were more stars out here than in Boston. Especially with the power out, so you didn't have street lights fucking shit up.
Kennedy
Yeah, you didn't see stars like this in New York either. The last time she'd been able to look up and realize she couldn't count them had been back in Fandom, or "back when things were simpler," as Kennedy had started thinking of it. That was fitting. Tonight things were clearer, if not simpler, than they'd been in several very long months.
"Hey. I'm kind of a pro at shooting my mouth off too, Captain," Kennedy pointed out, a touch of wry humor sneaking into the nickname. "I know how that goes, and besides, you weren't exactly wrong."
She looked up into the sky, picking out a constellation at random and halfway trying to remember what whimsical nickname Tara had made up for it.
"Thing is, all this goes down as planned, I've got your back. Actually--" and now she looked back at Faith-- "might do that anyway."
Vi and Caridad (and a few of the others, more likely than not) might have their crushes. Kennedy was working on a case of hero-worship that could have the Wesley back in Fandom wanting, inexplicably, to bang his head into a wall repeatedly.
Faith
"Yeah?" Faith said, raising an eyebrow. She ... still didn't know how to take compliments. If that was a compliment. Was it? Or was Kennedy just thinking she had a better chance of keeping everyone alive than B did?
That would be a compliment, too. And probably not true. Buffy had a good track record with this kind of thing.
Maybe she just meant she wanted to be ... friends, or whatever. Faith really wasn't good at that, either. Just ask the most recent person to get anywhere close to her. The one she'd been avoiding ever since.
"Look, if it goes south down there," she said, "I dunno. I feel like I should say something. Like how you'd be a hell of a Slayer, in case you don't get to, but ... if the spell doesn't work, and I don't make it out, don't worry about me. Just ... get the fuck out of there. If it goes bad and B's down, and I'm down, get everyone you can out. Go to LA, find Angel. B told me the first rule of Slaying is don't die. So ... don't."
Faith was also great at big finale speeches. See why Buffy was the leader?
Kennedy
Yes, Kennedy had noticed the weird vibes between Faith and Robin the past couple of days. See how she wasn't gonna ask about that?
"Good rule. Keeps it simple," she remarked. God, why did it feel like she'd just been given orders? Beyond that, why was she willing to take them and not ask questions for once? Oh, probably because years of dreaming about this was hovering on the edge of being not so much just a dream any more and it was... actually kind of serious business.
She twitched one hand at her side as if she'd been about to salute (playfully, or seriously? Who knew?) but thought twice about it.
"I'll get 'em out if I have to. Promise."
Faith
"Man, and I said Buffy made the end of the world no fun," Faith said, offering Kennedy a wry smile.
All right. If Kennedy was gonna get the others out, then she didn't have to worry about them, and that was one thing off her head. It was kind of peaceful out here. There wasn't anything left to do, was there? Just ... wait. Faith hated waiting.
Robin had rolled his eyes. Said she should call him when she was done playing games. Not her fault that he didn't get the memo.
Enough about him.
"Okay, first thing you wanna do if we don't die," she said. "Tell you what, Boarding School. We both make it out, I'll take you on a real Southie pub crawl."
Kennedy
Kennedy laughed and held a hand out. "Deal. Celebrating being alive with one hell of a hangover? I can work with that."
What would she do first thing, anyway? That was kind of a tough choice.
"...though, I think if I look at my survival checklist, I wanna take Willow on an actual date." They'd skipped right on past the U-Haul step and all, but in her defense, big loomy evil was hell on proper social procedures.
Faith
"You're stuck with it now," Faith agreed, shaking Kennedy's hand with a grin. "No snobby comments about the blue-collar decor, Boarding School."
She considered the rest of it, and then cracked up. "You be careful with her," she said. "Watchers never warn you about that part, but the whole Slayer strength, it doesn't have an off switch. Next time I got busy with a guy? I wasn't even thinking. I got a little ... enthusiastic, and I straight-up cracked his ribs."
So ... play nicely with the witch, Kennedy.
Kennedy
"Aye-aye, Captain," Kennedy shot back. Hey, if they were gonna play the nickname game...
And then she took in the rest of what Faith had said, and her eyes widened. "Oh, god. I didn't even think about that." That was going to be a fun lesson in impulse control.
Faith
See, Faith had helpful advice. She ought to be handing out pamphlets. Slaying 101: Shit Your Watcher Never Told You.
"Not a big deal if you watch yourself," she said, entirely too amused by Kennedy's expression. "Just a couple down the side, didn't even puncture anything, and we were going pretty good. Fuck if he didn't whine. Some guys are just pussies."
This was Faith, attempting to be reassuring. Results may vary.
"Do I get to be Captain Morgan?" Faith asked. "Get a big-assed hat, sprinkle people with rum? That could be hilarious."
Kennedy
"Wouldn't know. I bat strictly for my own team," Kennedy said good-naturedly, but smirking.
She thought it was reassuring.
Considering the Captain Morgan thing for a moment-- and snickering at the mental image-- she decided, "Sure, why the hell not? Sprinkling rum on people would make a good celebration after this."
For starters. And of course assuming there was an 'after this,' so she'd just keep talking about it like it was going to happen, okay?
Faith
"Yeah?" Faith asked. "No clingy ex-boyfriend from before you figured it out? Some people say they always knew."
She squinted up at the stars, wishing -- possibly for the first time in her life -- that she'd learned constellations. Stories, up in the sky, how cool was that?
"I don't ... really stick with a team," Faith admitted. She wasn't exactly sure why she was going on about this, so she lifted her shoulders.
"Pouring rum on people during a South Boston bar crawl is a good way to start a fight," she said. "This whole adventure keeps sounding better. We should go during St. Patrick's, next year. Whole city's puking green. Haven't lived until you've seen that."
Kennedy
"I'm totally one of those some people, then, 'cause yeah. Pretty much, I always knew." Kennedy stuck her hands in her pockets and shrugged.
Then laughed.
"I dunno. Hell of a day for you to want to risk being seen with a New Yorker, but I'm in if you are."
Faith
"Hey, we make it out of here, not even pissed Sox fans will be able to scare me," Faith grinned. "We'll get you a flak jacket if you don't think you can handle it."
It was nice out here. Quiet. Kinda calm. She wasn't really the type to go for calm. So ... that was weird.
"We'll be all right."
She wasn't sure she even believed it yet. But she was the big sister here, so she should be the one to say it. And it sounded good hearing it.
Kennedy
It did sound good; it got a smile out of Kennedy, anyway.
"Tchah, I can handle it," she scoffed lightly. "Baseball fans are..."
She tilted her head.
"Possibly more scary than Ubervamps if you piss 'em off enough, but whatever, right?"
She nodded firmly. "We'll be good. We will."
They could keep saying it. It'd sound real enough eventually. Maybe.
Dawn
Dawn was researching. Because, well. Because. You never knew, right? Right? It might help?
...also it kept her mind off the We're All Gonna Die running through her brain.
Kennedy
It was tradition, right? It'd always been tradition in Fandom, too, so having someone around to keep hitting the books made Kennedy feel a little better, so when she came back inside and spotted Dawn at the table she headed over.
"Any last-minute super important leads?" she asked as lightly as she could.
Really, who in this house didn't have a little bit of that We're All Gonna Die running through their brain tonight?
Dawn
"Vasil the Vulgar is supposed to rise in 2016," Dawn said, brushing hair out of her face. "So, you know. There has to be an Earth for him to rise into. I'm trying to think that's an optimistic thing." She sighed and shut another book. "I just wish I could find some confirmation or clue about that amulet. Or anything else."
Kennedy
"Nothing new on the Scythe, huh?" Kennedy guessed. "Still don't get how it's existed all this time and nobody knew."
A mystical weapon that hadn't been in any records, conveniently hidden right here in Sunnydale all along, in an ancient tomb that nobody had noticed before, and really, over seven years of patrolling every inch of this town and you'd think Buffy would've seen it, but no. Maybe that was too much logic for this late in the game.
It was all really last-minute and out-of-nowhere, and here they were pinning all their hopes on it. What about that didn't have desperation written all over?
Dawn
"Nothing specific enough to definitely be it. Plenty of magic weapons, nothing exactly like ours." Dawn leaned back, folding her arms. "I hate it when it seems like Destiny is setting us up. Hide the secret stupid amulet and the super-secret weapon just until one day before we have to use them-- why is that a good plan? Why couldn't they send us a memo? 'By the way, if you're interested, we'll be handing over the goods, but now you'll have time to validate the information'? Powers types are worse than E-bay sellers with bad ratings." Someone had been hanging out with Anya again.
Kennedy
Kennedy noticed that, and snickered.
"I feel like my English teachers in school would've had a few things to say about this, possibly in Latin, except I would've had to pay more attention to know," she admitted. "But whatever. Not like real life's a fairy tale or anything."
She blew out a breath.
"Lot closer to the highest high-stakes table in Vegas right now, actually."
Dawn
Dawn glared at Kennedy without heat. "Thanks for reminding me." Then, thoughtfully, "We should go to Vegas after this. 'Cause we'll have tons of good karma to get rid of."
Kennedy
Kennedy huffed a brief laugh. "After this? I think a vacation is totally in order. We so deserve it." A pause, an almost uncomfortable one. "Your sister most of all, I think."
Yes, it was in fact humanly possible for Kennedy to admit she might have been wrong. In an oblique way, but still.
Dawn
Dawn looked down at the books again, and said, "Yeah," in a very subdued voice. Maybe she should have gone with Buffy when she stormed out before, but she'd needed the break from her too. And now... "It'll never be over. We got used to that ages ago. But I think -- I think it's been so long since she had a break, she wouldn't know what to do. But I'd like to see her try."
Heaven didn't count. Not when she had to come back. But someplace fun, someplace she didn't have to slay something... plans were already boiling in Dawn's brain.
Kennedy
"Hey. This works the way it's supposed to, it's not like she'll have to play catch-up when she gets back," Kennedy said, putting an extra touch of firmness into her voice. Willow might be nervous as all hell about what she had to do-- hell, Kennedy was scared, thinking about it-- but no way was Kennedy letting on anything other than complete confidence in front of anyone else.
"Besides, that's where you come in, yeah? You can, like... sit on her and make her take a break." Kennedy grinned conspiratorially. "Little sister powers pack a pretty good sucker punch."
She ought to know; Jañe's did, and from what she knew of Dawn already, the younger Summers was no slouch either.
Dawn
Dawn straightened, face brightening. "True. It's not like she can send me away at this point. I'd love to see her try." She smirked. "Short of drugging me and putting me on a bus, but I'd just come back. And punch her." And call her a dumbass."
She huffed. "Okay. Knocking off for celebratory pre-slayage ice cream in one hour, then sleeping, unlike some people--" Significant look. "--so I'm all fresh and ready to be terrified out of my mind tomorrow. Plan!"
Kennedy
Kennedy raised both hands and gave Dawn a very innocent look: the kind she used to use on her dad whenever she got in trouble, that had always worked to ridiculously good effect.
"Yeah, good luck with the ice cream. I think Xander and Anya ate it all the other night."
While also not sleeping. Y'know.
"Besides, some of us have very important moral support duties to take care of tonight." And being too keyed up to sleep, but details.
Dawn
"And if a little immoral support happens while you're there, hey, we all might die tomorrow. Better get those really last-minute jollies while they're available," Dawn said without missing a beat. "Plus no. Giles and I got some ice cream. While you ... got some."
Kennedy
Kennedy opened her mouth, made a squeaking noise, and snapped her mouth shut again.
Congratulations, Dawn. You broke her cool factor!
"...nice one," she finally had to concede, not at all grudgingly. "Does Buffy know you know how to talk like that?"
Dawn
Dawn beamed at her. "Nah. I'm saving it up for later. Depending on what happens with Spike." She cocked her head. "So, that tongue ring's working out for you, hunh?"
That was probably as close as Dawn was going to get to, 'congratulations.'
Kennedy
Kennedy did not turn red or anything like that. Actually, her first instinct was to smirk and click said tongue ring against her teeth before remembering she probably shouldn't be doing that in front of Buffy's little sister.
"Guess you have to keep wondering, huh?"
Not really, Kennedy, no. The walls in this house were not soundproof.
Dawn
Dawn snorted. Grinned. Evilly.
"You would think. And yet..." Epic eyeroll. "I think you owe Giles therapy danger-money."
Kennedy
Oh, the responses she could come up with to that. The responses that she reluctantly kept to herself.
"Do not. He's a Watcher; a little scandalizing every now and then's good for him," Kennedy retorted mildly.
Dawn
Dawn smirked. "He almost rubbed through his glasses when you guys started vocalizing... and you owe me for the ice cream." She sniffed, opening up another book. "Also, on the second movement, you were flat."
Muahahaahaha.
Kennedy
"Tchah." Kennedy raised the Eyebrow of Supreme Skepticism at her. "Didn't hear any complaints from the interested party. Y'know, keep that up and your sister's gonna find out you're apparently expert enough to critique..."
Dawn
"If I am, it's her fault. Hers and Xander's. And Anya's," Dawn said airily. "The interested party did sound pretty happy. I might even tell her that." She paused. "After we save the world."
No sense making Willow babble and flail before she did her part, nope.
Kennedy
"Yeah, and not before then," Kennedy replied, pretending to look stern and warning but not really succeeding. "Also I'm cutting this line of conversation off right here before your sister kills me, 'cause we can't have that before we save the world either."
It was a good excuse to take off right about then, anyway.
Andrew
"Looooong ago," began the figure in the red cloak, candlelight flickering across the pages from which he read, in his spookiest voice. "In days of yore..."
Xander
Across the table, leaning on his good arm, Xander narrowed his eyes. "If the next words out of his mouth are 'It all began with a god named Thor,' I'm outta here."
He wasn't dying with that earworm, and anyway, who the hell plagiarized a roleplaying plot from JoCo? Granted, Xander's idea of roleplaying was... probably not Andrew's, since it involved a lot more plagiarizing from Space Battles. Specifically the gold bikini.
Giles
Giles had no idea why he was participating in this silliness. None at all.
"Thor?" he repeated, rubbing his temple. What on earth did Thor have to do with this?
...why even try to get the reference, Giles? Why? It would only lead to disappointment.
Amanda
"It's a dungeon delve, not an extended campaign," said Amanda, busy arranging her dice and character sheets to the exact specifications of her liking. This was serious business, and if it'd been a school-sanctioned extracurricular activity she'd have taken it. Yes, on top of swing choir. "I don't see why Thor can't show up as an NPC."
She tapped a pencil against her lips and smiled. "Or maybe sentient Swedish furniture? I think something like that might have happened once. Hey, what kind of stats would sentient Swedish furniture have, anyway?"
Anya
"Have you met an IKEA demon?" Anya asked, making a face as she tried to decipher her character sheet. "Xander, do this for me. I mean, Swedish demons are alarmingly efficient most of the time, and they just love screwing with people."
"How do you think Lutfisk happened?"
Xander
"Hey, leaning here. Can't lean and write. Plus you say that like I ever played this game before," Xander added, in no way taking advantage of the fact that Willow wasn't here to give him a bitch, please look for that statement. He did, however, peer over Anya's shoulder at the sheet. "I'm thinking you might want chaotic neutral there."
Andrew
"Thor will not be involved in this adventure, and neither will IKEA demons," Andrew sniffed with what he thought was extreme dignity, but wasn't.
Dignity would have been not scrambling through his sourcebook for another plotline at the last second.
Anya
"You lost an arm, not an eye," Anya pointed. "You can read just fine."
"What's a chaotic neutral and why do I care?"
Giles
Giles looked down at his own character sheet. "A dwarf!?" he exclaimed, looking appalled. "I -- well, I'd like another one."
Amanda
Amanda looked up from her character sheet and gave him a mildly reproachful look. "If you re-roll all your stats there's no guarantee you'll get something better," she pointed out with the long-suffering patience of a roleplaying veteran... who also happened to have a ninth-level sorcerer character in possession of several high-powered magical artifacts.
Guess who'd spent a lot of time today wondering what the stats on that Scythe might be, in D&D rules?
"Besides, dwarves are handy characters to have in any party," she added out of a need to be conciliatory.
Let it be noted that she hadn't actually gotten a look at Giles's strength stat.
Andrew
"No takebacks," Andrew confirmed succinctly and oh so maturely.
Giles
"Fine, fine," Giles relented, turning his attention back to his stats.
He sighed at you aaaall.
Xander
"When do I get to hit something?" Xander asked. "'Cause I'd really, really like to hit something. Soon."
Anya
"I say it like you've played this game before, because you once thought our 'monster of the week' was from your D&D manual," Anya pointed out. Lovingly. Really. "But I concur. Action, now, before I fall asleep over the nitpicking and lack of dancing monkeys."
Kennedy
Hey, Kennedy saw people sitting around the table with papers and things, looking intent, and she thought they were strategizing or something.
"Shouldn't we be saving the action for the morning?"
Giles
"What?"
Oh. From a distance, this must look like actual work.
"These aren't, ah. Actual plans," Giles explained. It occured to him that he was a bit embarrassed to be participating in this activity, yes.
Anya
"Besides, any and all actual 'action' will probably take place once most of you are fast asleep and unable to be traumatized." THANK YOU, ANYA. REALLY. THAT WAS (PROBABLY) NOT WHAT KENNEDY MEANT.
(if it was...GOD, KENNEDY.)
Xander
"And won't involve Andrew."
GOD, ANYA.
...GOD, XANDER.
Amanda
Look at Amanda focusing very determinedly on the question... of what they were doing, and not the question about any, um, action. SHE'D HAD ENOUGH OF THAT TRAUMA THIS WEEK.
GOD, ALL OF YOU.
"Do you really think any of us are going to get any sleep tonight?" She didn't seem all that nervous about it, but then again let the maniacally precise placement of her dice and pencil relative to her character sheet serve as Exhibit A. To Kennedy she added, by way of explanation, "So we're roleplaying instead. It's... sort of preparation?"
Not really, no.
Giles
"Very helpful, strategically speaking," Giles piped up.
Not really at all.
Kennedy
Oh, the look Kennedy was giving all of them. The narrowed-eyes, twitching-eyebrow, thing-that-wasn't-quite-a-dubious-smile look.
"Riiiiiiiiiight." Look, she hadn't been able to contact Fandom in forever. How were any of them supposed to know D&D could actually be a viable world-saving strategy?
The aforementioned Look bore a definite hint of my god, you are all giant nerds, and that was before she even considered Andrew's cloak.
"Maybe I should leave you guys to your important strategizing?"
After leaving the geektastic cluster to their D&D session and heading back upstairs, Kennedy stopped in to check on the other Potentials before going back to her room to find that Willow was right where she had been when Kennedy left in the first place: sitting on the bed with the Scythe beside her and a mess of books and papers everywhere.
Kennedy smiled and, careful not to disturb any of the undoubtedly painstakingly organized piles, stretched out on the bed behind her.
Willow
Willow was in no way panicking. That would imply that her freakout was leaving her with enough room to panic, and that was clearly not true.
"I really wish she hadn't said that about me."
Kennedy
Kennedy had curled up on the bed close enough to occasionally reach up and play with Willow's hair, in the interest of being nearby but not crowding her too much. There was a whole thing about not wanting to contribute to the totally-not-panicking, but also kind of needing the contact.
"What, the thing Buffy said?" She smiled. "I think it's true."
Willow
Willow squeaked. Sometimes noises said more than words. Well, words were noises so technically they were one and the same but even so. Squeaking. It went well with freak outting.
Kennedy
And freak outting called for attempts at being reassuring, naturally.
"I'll be with you," Kennedy reminded her, "to keep you grounded."
It was sort of her thing. Thus far, Kennedy was just fine with her assigned role in tomorrow's plan.
Willow
"Yeah, well, you might have to keep me stab-ded, if I go to the bad place," Willow replied. It was amazing how often she and her friends had to talk about killing each other for the greater good. More amazing was that Willow didn't even notice how strange it was. That and a shoddy school system were just part and parcel of living on a Hellmouth.
Kennedy
Was that a joke? Kennedy could never tell any more.
So when she sat up abruptly, she had to check, and blurted out disbelievingly, "You're saying I might have to kill you."
...that was a joke, right? Because tomorrow was going to be the first time since Buffy's spontaneous portal-dive that she was going to be around while Willow was working major magic, which was already less reassuring than it could stand to be, and oh god Willow's nervous babbling was totally contagious at least to her internal narrative.
Willow
"I am," Willow replied.
Kennedy
So not a joke then. Kennedy suddenly liked her job a lot less.
Which she could have said, except now it was her turn to have a freakout.
"Bite me!"
That counted as a freakout. Hush.
Willow
"I will. I mean, I do." Willow sighed. "I do mean it. The darkest place I've ever been, this is what lies beyond that. This is too important for me to - "
Kennedy
"I believe in you. Buffy believes in you," Kennedy blurted out. Which was not exactly what she wanted to say; somewhere beneath the you want me to do what? freaking out was the memory of Raven in full demon visage, standing over the remains of a destroyed city while Kennedy and her friends let loose on her with all the lethal force they could muster.
Thinking of Jono delivering the final blow and how messed up he'd been afterward, and Tara saying, No one should ever have to kill someone they love.
She'd agreed at the time, and she'd believed it, and now...
Please don't make me have to do this, Kennedy wanted to ask. But she was in this now, no takebacks; if Willow had to take risks (really big ones, all things considered), she couldn't really make that request, could she?
Willow
"You know Buffy," Willow said, not without affection for her friend. "Sweet girl, not that bright."
Kennedy
"Hey, I'm the first one to call her out when she's not making any sense," Kennedy pointed out. Perhaps unnecessarily, except note how she wasn't disparaging Buffy's ideas right now.
"In fact, this may have escaped your keen notice, but I'm..." She rolled her eyes playfully. "Kind of a brat. I've sorta always gotten my way." She couldn't give any helpful advice about the actual spellcasting, but she could be supportive, so hey, might as well be herself about it.
Better to do that than focus on her own fears.
"So you're gonna make it through this. No matter how dark it gets, 'cause now?" You're my way."
Willow
Well there was no way Willow was able to hear that without giving Kennedy a kiss. It was a grateful kiss, though not too long of one. After all, Willow wouldn't be Willow if she didn't try to prepare.
"I better go over this again," Willow said, indicating her paperwork.
Kennedy
Kennedy would really expect nothing less of her.
Hopefully her little pep talk would do some good. No way to know now, though, so she just settled down, rested her chin against Willow's shoulder, and got comfortable. Just in case things went badly tomorrow... well, she wasn't going anywhere the rest of the night.
[[nfi/nfb, ooc-okay, omg almost done you guys. adapted from and based on btvs 7x22, "chosen." preplay courtesy of my oh-my-god-i-love-every-single-one-of-you epically amazing npc cast: annieadderall as stillbaking, life_inshadow as followshisblood, angelo_wings as neverfaithful, regretiz4suckas as inthekeyofme, needsaparrot as xander and andrew, icecoldfrost as children4cash, wesleynotponcy as notagoodwatcher, and willbedone.]]
The amulet was in Spike's hands now, and Kennedy couldn't help hoping that this meant good things for him. She'd gotten to really like the guy.
...not that she got how the amulet was supposed to help them, exactly, just that Buffy had gotten it from Angel, who wasn't really clear on the translation of what it was supposed to do. (Kennedy was willing to bet Wesley had had a hand in that, but what did she know, really?)
The bad: the biggest fight of their lives was staring them in the face, and the fate of the world might hinge on their success. Really big gamble, based on what little concrete information they had.
Still. This was it, and everyone was gathered in the living room to hear Buffy speak.
Buffy
Buffy knew that her speechifying had put a lot of people off. Or, all the people. But today, everyone gathered in her living room was going to have to listen to it again, and this time they better be paying attention.
"I hate this," she said, moving through the tightly-packed crowd so they could all see her. "I hate being here. I hate that you have to be here. I hate that there's evil, that it's growing, and I hate that I was chosen to fight it. I wish, a whole lot of the time, that I hadn't been." She smiled wryly. "I know a lot of you wish I hadn't been, either."
Deny it, girls. Dare you to.
"But this isn't about wishes. This is about choices. I never had one. I was chosen. And I accept that." Much as it sucked so extremely hard sometimes. "I'm not asking you to accept anything. I'm asking you to make your own choice. I believe we can beat this evil- not when it comes, not after its army is ready, but now.
"Tomorrow morning I'm opening the Seal," Buffy continued. "I'm going down into the Hellmouth and I'm going to finish it once and for all. I've got strong allies: warriors, charms, sorcerers, and I'll need them all. But I'll also need you. Every single one of you. So now you're asking yourself, 'What makes this different? What makes us anything more than a bunch of girls getting picked off one by one?' It's true none of you has the power Faith and I have. I think both of us would have to die for a new Slayer to be called, and we can't even be sure that girl is in this room. That's the rule." Plus Buffy'd already died twice, it got old kinda fast. One of these times she was bound to not come back from it.
"So here's the part where you make a choice. What if you could have that power? Now. All of you. In every generation one Slayer is born because a bunch of guys that died thousands of years ago made up that rule. They were powerful men." Buffy raised her arm, pointing to Willow. "This woman is more powerful than all of them combined."
No pressure, Will.
"So I say we change the rules. I say my power should be our power. Tomorrow Willow will use the essence of this scythe," she said, picking it up and holding it for them to see, "that contains the energy and history of so many Slayers, to change our destiny. From now on, every girl in the world who might be a Slayer, will be a Slayer. Every girl who could have the power, will have the power. Who can stand up, will stand up. Every one of you, and girls we've never known, and generations to come... they will have strength they never dreamed of, and more than that, they will have each other. Slayers. Every one of us."
It amazed even her that she could go on that long sometimes. Fact was, though, she meant every single word of it, and she hoped they all knew it. And that they trusted her enough.
"Make your choice. Are you ready to be strong?"
***
No one was sleeping tonight, that much was for sure. Nerves, excitement, the desperate urge to puke, whatever; tomorrow morning they'd be taking the fight right to the First.
Right to the incorporeal evil.
Kennedy had spent most of the day upstairs with Willow, just sticking around to be supportive girl while Willow went over notes and research, but after a while she couldn't sit still any more and excused herself to take a walk through the house.
Still seizing the day, like Drake had said. She had never done regrets, and she wasn't about to start now, so... time to talk to everyone just in case it might be the last time.
Spike
Spike could only spend so long in the basement, staring at the bloody Liz Taylor champion pendant until he just about expected it to tap dance.
He suspected later he'd find the Slayer (and in his head, Buffy would always be the Slayer, even if soon there would be a couple thousand other girls with the same claim), or she'd find him, and they'd ... do whatever it was they were doing these days. But for now, he'd be out on the porch, getting some nice fresh air and polluting it with his cigarette. Wasn't like the air quality made so much difference to him, either way.
The pendant was in his jacket pocket, and every few seconds he'd run a thumb over the stone just to make sure it hadn't vanished. Him, a champion.
The world was very strange indeed.
Kennedy
When Kennedy spotted him through the window, she slipped out onto the porch, shut the door behind her, and leaned against it with her thumbs in her pockets.
"Y'know, there's supposed to be a law in this state about doing that at least fifteen feet away from doorways."
It was an awkward attempt at Scooby humor in the face of doom, granted, but she had to open somehow.
Spike
"Is there," Spike said, finishing his drag before he stubbed the cigarette out on the railing. "Somehow I don't think a patrol car's gonna happen to cite me for it tonight."
What with how the entire population of Sunnydale had fled in a panic, and such.
He looked over to Kennedy. "How's Red holding up?"
Kennedy
"Well, didn't you just luck out, then?" Kennedy glanced down Revello Drive, completely, totally, and freakishly in the dark except for the faint candlelight glow from inside the house. They'd be able to see-- and hear, with the absolute quiet-- any headlights that might pull down the street, and there wouldn't be any of those coming.
Not that there was anything they could do about that with the power company (and everyone else, of course) AWOL. Not that it helped people's nerves, though.
She took a breath. "She's freaking a little, I think." Or a lot, but now was not the time for Kennedy to say anything that might be construed as slander, and miraculously she actually realized it. "Can't really blame her, all things considered."
Spike
Spike nodded slowly, taking that in. "I'd be more worried about her if she wasn't," he said. "And the girls, are you all ready and eager for the shiny power upgrade?"
He was being dismissive, he knew it. But sometimes it was the only way to handle the really big stuff.
Kennedy
"Can't speak for everyone, but me?" Kennedy spread her hands. "Hey, bring it. No more could-be might-be if-you-hold-your-breath stuff. Hell, I've been ready for this my whole life."
Despite the words, she wasn't quite as exuberant as might have been expected. Willow's nervousness and the weight of everyone else's anticipation: those were contagious.
"How 'bout you? You set for... whatever it is you're gonna do?"
Spike
Spike plucked the medallion out of his pocket, held it aloft to see it glitter dimly in the candlelight and starlight.
"Figure once this is over, I can auction the bauble off and be set for a few decades," he said. "Funny. All those years trying to kill the slayer, never would have thought she'd end up picking me for a Champion."
He twirled the medallion a bit more. "Long strange road for both of us."
He wasn't ready. At the same time, it felt inevitable. Spike wasn't a patient vampire at the best of times, and the wait for morning was all but unbearable.
Kennedy
Especially with him being nocturnal and all...
Oh, right, because anyone else was going to be sleeping.
She'd said she was rooting for him, and Kennedy moved over to perch on the porch railing, then mimed shaking a pair of pom-poms at him.
"Yay for the unexpected, I guess?" She peered at the medallion. "Wouldn't really have picked that as your kinda style, gotta say."
Spike
Spike smirked at that. You couldn't go so far as to call it a smile.
"Yeah? I think it sets off the leather perfectly."
Kennedy
"Hey." Kennedy clicked her tongue stud against her teeth loudly. "If you're gonna go the jewelry route, might as well go all out, but you really might wanna think about this one."
Spike
"Maybe." Spike twirled it again. "You know, it's Angel's fault. Git's dim enough to have picked out the shiniest style he could find."
A little sire-slandering always helped to pass the time.
Kennedy
Kennedy could appreciate that.
"Goes with the whole Champion thing," she offered. "Kinda like a Super Bowl ring."
She took a breath. "I lied, earlier. It suits you."
The Champion thing, not the giant gaudy bauble, but she hoped he knew what she meant.
Spike
"I just said, it's the poof's taste, not --"
Spike was irritated, or mock-irritated, enough that it took him a moment to realize what Kennedy meant. When he did, he softened and almost smiled again.
"I hope it will," he said simply. "And the hero gig's gonna look good on you, too."
Kennedy
Kennedy could've said something flippant about not getting weepy, this wasn't a Lifetime movie or one of Spike's soap operas, but--
She just nodded once. "Hope it does. Kinda figures, huh? Right when I gave up on that ever happening." A beat. "If not, I totally expect you to make fun of me for it later."
Spike
"I'm not planning on going anywhere."
Even though he was getting the feeling he might have to. Sometimes the champion slayed the dragon; sometimes things went the other way around. But that wasn't a thought to frighten baby slayers with.
Kennedy
"Good." And that was a look of gratitude, because the possibility of any of them not making it through the next morning had not eluded Kennedy's thoughts, but she got it now, how sometimes talking about these things was the vastly less-fun alternative. "'cause you've got practice at it now, and I'd hate to have to find a replacement."
She kicked her heels idly against the porch railing for a few seconds, feeling the vibrations coming up through her hands. This might threaten to get maudlin, and nobody needed that.
"Good luck, yeah?"
Spike
"Same to you," Spike said, and finally stowed the gem back in his pocket. This conversation showed all the signs of going decidedly maudlin if it wasn't ended now, and maudlin wasn't how Spike wanted to spend what could be the last night of either of their lives.
He took on a final tone when he next spoke, though not an unkind one.
"Now, you probably still need to get ready, and I have important ... champion ... brooding in the basement to do."
Besides. He really wanted to see Buffy.
Kennedy
And Kennedy wanted to get back upstairs to Willow, so they were kind of on the same page there.
"Can't stand in the way of that," she agreed as she stepped out of the way of the front door. "Go on, brood in style."
She figured she was as ready as she was going to get. The rest was just waiting.
Faith
Faith couldn't stop pacing tonight. The bleach-blond vampire was on the porch, so she'd taken to prowling the front sidewalk.
Some of it was the upcoming fight. Some of it was waking up again. First the coma, then the mystical mind-shit with Angel, and then being knocked out for a day or two after that fucking bomb the Bringers had planted special for them.
She hated losing time. Slayer meant you died early, everybody knew it, and that didn't bother her because she never figured anything else for herself, but losing big chunks of it from the middle, somehow that didn't seem fair. Like someone snuck up behind you and stole change out of your pockets.
She wanted to be awake right now. Had to stay awake right now. If she went down tomorrow in this apocalypse shit, she wouldn't want to have spent tonight asleep.
Kennedy
The concussion-like parts had to be a bitch, too.
Kennedy had meant to go back inside after talking to Spike, but she did owe Faith that apology, after all, and now seemed as good a time as any to give it, so when she realized who was out there on the sidewalk she drifted that way instead.
"Hey. Sleep not happening for you either, huh?"
Faith
"Hey," Faith said, ducking her head and acknowledging the other girl. "Don't wanna sleep. Kinda ... got too much inside right now. Couldn't sleep if I wanted to."
She folded her arms, glad she'd had a moment to say this. Especially since they might all die tomorrow, in which case ... actually, in that case it really wouldn't fucking matter anyway, would it?
"I heard you kicked ass back there," she said.
Kennedy
She could've bragged about it, and maybe she had a right to, but they'd come home without four of the girls including Bryn, whom Kennedy had been working with extensively the past week since she'd turned out to be really promising with a crossbow. It put a damper on wanting to pat herself on the back.
Instead, Kennedy just nodded once, briefly. "Someone had to get 'em out as alive as possible. Which..." She frowned in the darkness, took a breath. "Kinda blows, pressure-wise. I sort of get that now."
Not quite an apology, not yet. She was working her way up to that.
Faith
"Not the most fun I've had," Faith agreed with a sigh. "I don't think Slayers do 'meek.' The First is trying to enslave humanity, morale sucks, and I just lost some of our girls to a bullshit trap. Not my best outing."
Which sounded like bullshit self-pity, so she took a breath, blew it out, and waved the thought away.
"It's not important. Look. You were in a bad situation, everyone's injured, everyone's panicking. Someone had to take charge, herd everyone out of there, get the wounded, and get the fuck out of Dodge. And you stepped up like a pro. You guys even tried to take down one of those ubervamps." She shrugged. "I'm just saying. Don't sell yourself short."
Which marked what was possibly the first time anyone ever said that to Kennedy with a straight face.
Kennedy
That was entirely possible. There was an incredibly good chance of it, actually; mostly, lectures on her opinion of herself tended to warn her to tone it the hell down.
Thus the look of genuine surprise on Kennedy's face, followed by the closest thing to a self-deprecating half-smile that anyone had gotten out of her in a long time.
"I didn't know what else to do," she admitted. "Gotta say it scared the shit out of me even more than the whole bait thing did."
Faith
"Scared the shit out of me, too," Faith said. Hey, speaking of unexpected vulnerabilities. "Not that night, I mean, I was out cold and all. But ... being in charge. Trying not to fuck up, making shit up as I went along, hoping people took me seriously. Sorry if I came down a little hard on you, Boarding School."
Kennedy may not be the only person she had been unfair to lately, her brain wanted to insist, but that was crap and it should shut up already.
Kennedy
"'s all good." Kennedy let out a little laugh. "Most people think I deserve that... not sure they're really wrong. But y'know, you scared the shit out of me that night, being out cold."
It really, really had.
"Kinda funny, huh? First you tell me if you get taken out, I might be the next one in line, and then all that shit goes down and all I can think is I really don't want it if it's gonna happen like that."
Faith
"I was just shooting my mouth off," Faith said, fidgeting awkwardly and glancing away. "You shouldn't listen to me. I get taken out, it's just my time, that's all. I'm probably overdue."
This could be her last night, ever, and she wasn't smoking. She wasn't shooting heroin, or drunk off her ass. She wasn't getting laid, because that got messy last time, and now it was all complicated. So instead she was here thinking about shit and possibly wasting her last hours ever not getting stoned or fucked. Smart thinking, Faith.
"B pulls this off, it may not have to go down like that," she mused, leaning back against the porch railing.
It was a good night to stare up at the sky. There were more stars out here than in Boston. Especially with the power out, so you didn't have street lights fucking shit up.
Kennedy
Yeah, you didn't see stars like this in New York either. The last time she'd been able to look up and realize she couldn't count them had been back in Fandom, or "back when things were simpler," as Kennedy had started thinking of it. That was fitting. Tonight things were clearer, if not simpler, than they'd been in several very long months.
"Hey. I'm kind of a pro at shooting my mouth off too, Captain," Kennedy pointed out, a touch of wry humor sneaking into the nickname. "I know how that goes, and besides, you weren't exactly wrong."
She looked up into the sky, picking out a constellation at random and halfway trying to remember what whimsical nickname Tara had made up for it.
"Thing is, all this goes down as planned, I've got your back. Actually--" and now she looked back at Faith-- "might do that anyway."
Vi and Caridad (and a few of the others, more likely than not) might have their crushes. Kennedy was working on a case of hero-worship that could have the Wesley back in Fandom wanting, inexplicably, to bang his head into a wall repeatedly.
Faith
"Yeah?" Faith said, raising an eyebrow. She ... still didn't know how to take compliments. If that was a compliment. Was it? Or was Kennedy just thinking she had a better chance of keeping everyone alive than B did?
That would be a compliment, too. And probably not true. Buffy had a good track record with this kind of thing.
Maybe she just meant she wanted to be ... friends, or whatever. Faith really wasn't good at that, either. Just ask the most recent person to get anywhere close to her. The one she'd been avoiding ever since.
"Look, if it goes south down there," she said, "I dunno. I feel like I should say something. Like how you'd be a hell of a Slayer, in case you don't get to, but ... if the spell doesn't work, and I don't make it out, don't worry about me. Just ... get the fuck out of there. If it goes bad and B's down, and I'm down, get everyone you can out. Go to LA, find Angel. B told me the first rule of Slaying is don't die. So ... don't."
Faith was also great at big finale speeches. See why Buffy was the leader?
Kennedy
Yes, Kennedy had noticed the weird vibes between Faith and Robin the past couple of days. See how she wasn't gonna ask about that?
"Good rule. Keeps it simple," she remarked. God, why did it feel like she'd just been given orders? Beyond that, why was she willing to take them and not ask questions for once? Oh, probably because years of dreaming about this was hovering on the edge of being not so much just a dream any more and it was... actually kind of serious business.
She twitched one hand at her side as if she'd been about to salute (playfully, or seriously? Who knew?) but thought twice about it.
"I'll get 'em out if I have to. Promise."
Faith
"Man, and I said Buffy made the end of the world no fun," Faith said, offering Kennedy a wry smile.
All right. If Kennedy was gonna get the others out, then she didn't have to worry about them, and that was one thing off her head. It was kind of peaceful out here. There wasn't anything left to do, was there? Just ... wait. Faith hated waiting.
Robin had rolled his eyes. Said she should call him when she was done playing games. Not her fault that he didn't get the memo.
Enough about him.
"Okay, first thing you wanna do if we don't die," she said. "Tell you what, Boarding School. We both make it out, I'll take you on a real Southie pub crawl."
Kennedy
Kennedy laughed and held a hand out. "Deal. Celebrating being alive with one hell of a hangover? I can work with that."
What would she do first thing, anyway? That was kind of a tough choice.
"...though, I think if I look at my survival checklist, I wanna take Willow on an actual date." They'd skipped right on past the U-Haul step and all, but in her defense, big loomy evil was hell on proper social procedures.
Faith
"You're stuck with it now," Faith agreed, shaking Kennedy's hand with a grin. "No snobby comments about the blue-collar decor, Boarding School."
She considered the rest of it, and then cracked up. "You be careful with her," she said. "Watchers never warn you about that part, but the whole Slayer strength, it doesn't have an off switch. Next time I got busy with a guy? I wasn't even thinking. I got a little ... enthusiastic, and I straight-up cracked his ribs."
So ... play nicely with the witch, Kennedy.
Kennedy
"Aye-aye, Captain," Kennedy shot back. Hey, if they were gonna play the nickname game...
And then she took in the rest of what Faith had said, and her eyes widened. "Oh, god. I didn't even think about that." That was going to be a fun lesson in impulse control.
Faith
See, Faith had helpful advice. She ought to be handing out pamphlets. Slaying 101: Shit Your Watcher Never Told You.
"Not a big deal if you watch yourself," she said, entirely too amused by Kennedy's expression. "Just a couple down the side, didn't even puncture anything, and we were going pretty good. Fuck if he didn't whine. Some guys are just pussies."
This was Faith, attempting to be reassuring. Results may vary.
"Do I get to be Captain Morgan?" Faith asked. "Get a big-assed hat, sprinkle people with rum? That could be hilarious."
Kennedy
"Wouldn't know. I bat strictly for my own team," Kennedy said good-naturedly, but smirking.
She thought it was reassuring.
Considering the Captain Morgan thing for a moment-- and snickering at the mental image-- she decided, "Sure, why the hell not? Sprinkling rum on people would make a good celebration after this."
For starters. And of course assuming there was an 'after this,' so she'd just keep talking about it like it was going to happen, okay?
Faith
"Yeah?" Faith asked. "No clingy ex-boyfriend from before you figured it out? Some people say they always knew."
She squinted up at the stars, wishing -- possibly for the first time in her life -- that she'd learned constellations. Stories, up in the sky, how cool was that?
"I don't ... really stick with a team," Faith admitted. She wasn't exactly sure why she was going on about this, so she lifted her shoulders.
"Pouring rum on people during a South Boston bar crawl is a good way to start a fight," she said. "This whole adventure keeps sounding better. We should go during St. Patrick's, next year. Whole city's puking green. Haven't lived until you've seen that."
Kennedy
"I'm totally one of those some people, then, 'cause yeah. Pretty much, I always knew." Kennedy stuck her hands in her pockets and shrugged.
Then laughed.
"I dunno. Hell of a day for you to want to risk being seen with a New Yorker, but I'm in if you are."
Faith
"Hey, we make it out of here, not even pissed Sox fans will be able to scare me," Faith grinned. "We'll get you a flak jacket if you don't think you can handle it."
It was nice out here. Quiet. Kinda calm. She wasn't really the type to go for calm. So ... that was weird.
"We'll be all right."
She wasn't sure she even believed it yet. But she was the big sister here, so she should be the one to say it. And it sounded good hearing it.
Kennedy
It did sound good; it got a smile out of Kennedy, anyway.
"Tchah, I can handle it," she scoffed lightly. "Baseball fans are..."
She tilted her head.
"Possibly more scary than Ubervamps if you piss 'em off enough, but whatever, right?"
She nodded firmly. "We'll be good. We will."
They could keep saying it. It'd sound real enough eventually. Maybe.
Dawn
Dawn was researching. Because, well. Because. You never knew, right? Right? It might help?
...also it kept her mind off the We're All Gonna Die running through her brain.
Kennedy
It was tradition, right? It'd always been tradition in Fandom, too, so having someone around to keep hitting the books made Kennedy feel a little better, so when she came back inside and spotted Dawn at the table she headed over.
"Any last-minute super important leads?" she asked as lightly as she could.
Really, who in this house didn't have a little bit of that We're All Gonna Die running through their brain tonight?
Dawn
"Vasil the Vulgar is supposed to rise in 2016," Dawn said, brushing hair out of her face. "So, you know. There has to be an Earth for him to rise into. I'm trying to think that's an optimistic thing." She sighed and shut another book. "I just wish I could find some confirmation or clue about that amulet. Or anything else."
Kennedy
"Nothing new on the Scythe, huh?" Kennedy guessed. "Still don't get how it's existed all this time and nobody knew."
A mystical weapon that hadn't been in any records, conveniently hidden right here in Sunnydale all along, in an ancient tomb that nobody had noticed before, and really, over seven years of patrolling every inch of this town and you'd think Buffy would've seen it, but no. Maybe that was too much logic for this late in the game.
It was all really last-minute and out-of-nowhere, and here they were pinning all their hopes on it. What about that didn't have desperation written all over?
Dawn
"Nothing specific enough to definitely be it. Plenty of magic weapons, nothing exactly like ours." Dawn leaned back, folding her arms. "I hate it when it seems like Destiny is setting us up. Hide the secret stupid amulet and the super-secret weapon just until one day before we have to use them-- why is that a good plan? Why couldn't they send us a memo? 'By the way, if you're interested, we'll be handing over the goods, but now you'll have time to validate the information'? Powers types are worse than E-bay sellers with bad ratings." Someone had been hanging out with Anya again.
Kennedy
Kennedy noticed that, and snickered.
"I feel like my English teachers in school would've had a few things to say about this, possibly in Latin, except I would've had to pay more attention to know," she admitted. "But whatever. Not like real life's a fairy tale or anything."
She blew out a breath.
"Lot closer to the highest high-stakes table in Vegas right now, actually."
Dawn
Dawn glared at Kennedy without heat. "Thanks for reminding me." Then, thoughtfully, "We should go to Vegas after this. 'Cause we'll have tons of good karma to get rid of."
Kennedy
Kennedy huffed a brief laugh. "After this? I think a vacation is totally in order. We so deserve it." A pause, an almost uncomfortable one. "Your sister most of all, I think."
Yes, it was in fact humanly possible for Kennedy to admit she might have been wrong. In an oblique way, but still.
Dawn
Dawn looked down at the books again, and said, "Yeah," in a very subdued voice. Maybe she should have gone with Buffy when she stormed out before, but she'd needed the break from her too. And now... "It'll never be over. We got used to that ages ago. But I think -- I think it's been so long since she had a break, she wouldn't know what to do. But I'd like to see her try."
Heaven didn't count. Not when she had to come back. But someplace fun, someplace she didn't have to slay something... plans were already boiling in Dawn's brain.
Kennedy
"Hey. This works the way it's supposed to, it's not like she'll have to play catch-up when she gets back," Kennedy said, putting an extra touch of firmness into her voice. Willow might be nervous as all hell about what she had to do-- hell, Kennedy was scared, thinking about it-- but no way was Kennedy letting on anything other than complete confidence in front of anyone else.
"Besides, that's where you come in, yeah? You can, like... sit on her and make her take a break." Kennedy grinned conspiratorially. "Little sister powers pack a pretty good sucker punch."
She ought to know; Jañe's did, and from what she knew of Dawn already, the younger Summers was no slouch either.
Dawn
Dawn straightened, face brightening. "True. It's not like she can send me away at this point. I'd love to see her try." She smirked. "Short of drugging me and putting me on a bus, but I'd just come back. And punch her." And call her a dumbass."
She huffed. "Okay. Knocking off for celebratory pre-slayage ice cream in one hour, then sleeping, unlike some people--" Significant look. "--so I'm all fresh and ready to be terrified out of my mind tomorrow. Plan!"
Kennedy
Kennedy raised both hands and gave Dawn a very innocent look: the kind she used to use on her dad whenever she got in trouble, that had always worked to ridiculously good effect.
"Yeah, good luck with the ice cream. I think Xander and Anya ate it all the other night."
While also not sleeping. Y'know.
"Besides, some of us have very important moral support duties to take care of tonight." And being too keyed up to sleep, but details.
Dawn
"And if a little immoral support happens while you're there, hey, we all might die tomorrow. Better get those really last-minute jollies while they're available," Dawn said without missing a beat. "Plus no. Giles and I got some ice cream. While you ... got some."
Kennedy
Kennedy opened her mouth, made a squeaking noise, and snapped her mouth shut again.
Congratulations, Dawn. You broke her cool factor!
"...nice one," she finally had to concede, not at all grudgingly. "Does Buffy know you know how to talk like that?"
Dawn
Dawn beamed at her. "Nah. I'm saving it up for later. Depending on what happens with Spike." She cocked her head. "So, that tongue ring's working out for you, hunh?"
That was probably as close as Dawn was going to get to, 'congratulations.'
Kennedy
Kennedy did not turn red or anything like that. Actually, her first instinct was to smirk and click said tongue ring against her teeth before remembering she probably shouldn't be doing that in front of Buffy's little sister.
"Guess you have to keep wondering, huh?"
Not really, Kennedy, no. The walls in this house were not soundproof.
Dawn
Dawn snorted. Grinned. Evilly.
"You would think. And yet..." Epic eyeroll. "I think you owe Giles therapy danger-money."
Kennedy
Oh, the responses she could come up with to that. The responses that she reluctantly kept to herself.
"Do not. He's a Watcher; a little scandalizing every now and then's good for him," Kennedy retorted mildly.
Dawn
Dawn smirked. "He almost rubbed through his glasses when you guys started vocalizing... and you owe me for the ice cream." She sniffed, opening up another book. "Also, on the second movement, you were flat."
Muahahaahaha.
Kennedy
"Tchah." Kennedy raised the Eyebrow of Supreme Skepticism at her. "Didn't hear any complaints from the interested party. Y'know, keep that up and your sister's gonna find out you're apparently expert enough to critique..."
Dawn
"If I am, it's her fault. Hers and Xander's. And Anya's," Dawn said airily. "The interested party did sound pretty happy. I might even tell her that." She paused. "After we save the world."
No sense making Willow babble and flail before she did her part, nope.
Kennedy
"Yeah, and not before then," Kennedy replied, pretending to look stern and warning but not really succeeding. "Also I'm cutting this line of conversation off right here before your sister kills me, 'cause we can't have that before we save the world either."
It was a good excuse to take off right about then, anyway.
Andrew
"Looooong ago," began the figure in the red cloak, candlelight flickering across the pages from which he read, in his spookiest voice. "In days of yore..."
Xander
Across the table, leaning on his good arm, Xander narrowed his eyes. "If the next words out of his mouth are 'It all began with a god named Thor,' I'm outta here."
He wasn't dying with that earworm, and anyway, who the hell plagiarized a roleplaying plot from JoCo? Granted, Xander's idea of roleplaying was... probably not Andrew's, since it involved a lot more plagiarizing from Space Battles. Specifically the gold bikini.
Giles
Giles had no idea why he was participating in this silliness. None at all.
"Thor?" he repeated, rubbing his temple. What on earth did Thor have to do with this?
...why even try to get the reference, Giles? Why? It would only lead to disappointment.
Amanda
"It's a dungeon delve, not an extended campaign," said Amanda, busy arranging her dice and character sheets to the exact specifications of her liking. This was serious business, and if it'd been a school-sanctioned extracurricular activity she'd have taken it. Yes, on top of swing choir. "I don't see why Thor can't show up as an NPC."
She tapped a pencil against her lips and smiled. "Or maybe sentient Swedish furniture? I think something like that might have happened once. Hey, what kind of stats would sentient Swedish furniture have, anyway?"
Anya
"Have you met an IKEA demon?" Anya asked, making a face as she tried to decipher her character sheet. "Xander, do this for me. I mean, Swedish demons are alarmingly efficient most of the time, and they just love screwing with people."
"How do you think Lutfisk happened?"
Xander
"Hey, leaning here. Can't lean and write. Plus you say that like I ever played this game before," Xander added, in no way taking advantage of the fact that Willow wasn't here to give him a bitch, please look for that statement. He did, however, peer over Anya's shoulder at the sheet. "I'm thinking you might want chaotic neutral there."
Andrew
"Thor will not be involved in this adventure, and neither will IKEA demons," Andrew sniffed with what he thought was extreme dignity, but wasn't.
Dignity would have been not scrambling through his sourcebook for another plotline at the last second.
Anya
"You lost an arm, not an eye," Anya pointed. "You can read just fine."
"What's a chaotic neutral and why do I care?"
Giles
Giles looked down at his own character sheet. "A dwarf!?" he exclaimed, looking appalled. "I -- well, I'd like another one."
Amanda
Amanda looked up from her character sheet and gave him a mildly reproachful look. "If you re-roll all your stats there's no guarantee you'll get something better," she pointed out with the long-suffering patience of a roleplaying veteran... who also happened to have a ninth-level sorcerer character in possession of several high-powered magical artifacts.
Guess who'd spent a lot of time today wondering what the stats on that Scythe might be, in D&D rules?
"Besides, dwarves are handy characters to have in any party," she added out of a need to be conciliatory.
Let it be noted that she hadn't actually gotten a look at Giles's strength stat.
Andrew
"No takebacks," Andrew confirmed succinctly and oh so maturely.
Giles
"Fine, fine," Giles relented, turning his attention back to his stats.
He sighed at you aaaall.
Xander
"When do I get to hit something?" Xander asked. "'Cause I'd really, really like to hit something. Soon."
Anya
"I say it like you've played this game before, because you once thought our 'monster of the week' was from your D&D manual," Anya pointed out. Lovingly. Really. "But I concur. Action, now, before I fall asleep over the nitpicking and lack of dancing monkeys."
Kennedy
Hey, Kennedy saw people sitting around the table with papers and things, looking intent, and she thought they were strategizing or something.
"Shouldn't we be saving the action for the morning?"
Giles
"What?"
Oh. From a distance, this must look like actual work.
"These aren't, ah. Actual plans," Giles explained. It occured to him that he was a bit embarrassed to be participating in this activity, yes.
Anya
"Besides, any and all actual 'action' will probably take place once most of you are fast asleep and unable to be traumatized." THANK YOU, ANYA. REALLY. THAT WAS (PROBABLY) NOT WHAT KENNEDY MEANT.
(if it was...GOD, KENNEDY.)
Xander
"And won't involve Andrew."
GOD, ANYA.
...GOD, XANDER.
Amanda
Look at Amanda focusing very determinedly on the question... of what they were doing, and not the question about any, um, action. SHE'D HAD ENOUGH OF THAT TRAUMA THIS WEEK.
GOD, ALL OF YOU.
"Do you really think any of us are going to get any sleep tonight?" She didn't seem all that nervous about it, but then again let the maniacally precise placement of her dice and pencil relative to her character sheet serve as Exhibit A. To Kennedy she added, by way of explanation, "So we're roleplaying instead. It's... sort of preparation?"
Not really, no.
Giles
"Very helpful, strategically speaking," Giles piped up.
Not really at all.
Kennedy
Oh, the look Kennedy was giving all of them. The narrowed-eyes, twitching-eyebrow, thing-that-wasn't-quite-a-dubious-smile look.
"Riiiiiiiiiight." Look, she hadn't been able to contact Fandom in forever. How were any of them supposed to know D&D could actually be a viable world-saving strategy?
The aforementioned Look bore a definite hint of my god, you are all giant nerds, and that was before she even considered Andrew's cloak.
"Maybe I should leave you guys to your important strategizing?"
After leaving the geektastic cluster to their D&D session and heading back upstairs, Kennedy stopped in to check on the other Potentials before going back to her room to find that Willow was right where she had been when Kennedy left in the first place: sitting on the bed with the Scythe beside her and a mess of books and papers everywhere.
Kennedy smiled and, careful not to disturb any of the undoubtedly painstakingly organized piles, stretched out on the bed behind her.
Willow
Willow was in no way panicking. That would imply that her freakout was leaving her with enough room to panic, and that was clearly not true.
"I really wish she hadn't said that about me."
Kennedy
Kennedy had curled up on the bed close enough to occasionally reach up and play with Willow's hair, in the interest of being nearby but not crowding her too much. There was a whole thing about not wanting to contribute to the totally-not-panicking, but also kind of needing the contact.
"What, the thing Buffy said?" She smiled. "I think it's true."
Willow
Willow squeaked. Sometimes noises said more than words. Well, words were noises so technically they were one and the same but even so. Squeaking. It went well with freak outting.
Kennedy
And freak outting called for attempts at being reassuring, naturally.
"I'll be with you," Kennedy reminded her, "to keep you grounded."
It was sort of her thing. Thus far, Kennedy was just fine with her assigned role in tomorrow's plan.
Willow
"Yeah, well, you might have to keep me stab-ded, if I go to the bad place," Willow replied. It was amazing how often she and her friends had to talk about killing each other for the greater good. More amazing was that Willow didn't even notice how strange it was. That and a shoddy school system were just part and parcel of living on a Hellmouth.
Kennedy
Was that a joke? Kennedy could never tell any more.
So when she sat up abruptly, she had to check, and blurted out disbelievingly, "You're saying I might have to kill you."
...that was a joke, right? Because tomorrow was going to be the first time since Buffy's spontaneous portal-dive that she was going to be around while Willow was working major magic, which was already less reassuring than it could stand to be, and oh god Willow's nervous babbling was totally contagious at least to her internal narrative.
Willow
"I am," Willow replied.
Kennedy
So not a joke then. Kennedy suddenly liked her job a lot less.
Which she could have said, except now it was her turn to have a freakout.
"Bite me!"
That counted as a freakout. Hush.
Willow
"I will. I mean, I do." Willow sighed. "I do mean it. The darkest place I've ever been, this is what lies beyond that. This is too important for me to - "
Kennedy
"I believe in you. Buffy believes in you," Kennedy blurted out. Which was not exactly what she wanted to say; somewhere beneath the you want me to do what? freaking out was the memory of Raven in full demon visage, standing over the remains of a destroyed city while Kennedy and her friends let loose on her with all the lethal force they could muster.
Thinking of Jono delivering the final blow and how messed up he'd been afterward, and Tara saying, No one should ever have to kill someone they love.
She'd agreed at the time, and she'd believed it, and now...
Please don't make me have to do this, Kennedy wanted to ask. But she was in this now, no takebacks; if Willow had to take risks (really big ones, all things considered), she couldn't really make that request, could she?
Willow
"You know Buffy," Willow said, not without affection for her friend. "Sweet girl, not that bright."
Kennedy
"Hey, I'm the first one to call her out when she's not making any sense," Kennedy pointed out. Perhaps unnecessarily, except note how she wasn't disparaging Buffy's ideas right now.
"In fact, this may have escaped your keen notice, but I'm..." She rolled her eyes playfully. "Kind of a brat. I've sorta always gotten my way." She couldn't give any helpful advice about the actual spellcasting, but she could be supportive, so hey, might as well be herself about it.
Better to do that than focus on her own fears.
"So you're gonna make it through this. No matter how dark it gets, 'cause now?" You're my way."
Willow
Well there was no way Willow was able to hear that without giving Kennedy a kiss. It was a grateful kiss, though not too long of one. After all, Willow wouldn't be Willow if she didn't try to prepare.
"I better go over this again," Willow said, indicating her paperwork.
Kennedy
Kennedy would really expect nothing less of her.
Hopefully her little pep talk would do some good. No way to know now, though, so she just settled down, rested her chin against Willow's shoulder, and got comfortable. Just in case things went badly tomorrow... well, she wasn't going anywhere the rest of the night.
[[nfi/nfb, ooc-okay, omg almost done you guys. adapted from and based on btvs 7x22, "chosen." preplay courtesy of my oh-my-god-i-love-every-single-one-of-you epically amazing npc cast: annieadderall as stillbaking, life_inshadow as followshisblood, angelo_wings as neverfaithful, regretiz4suckas as inthekeyofme, needsaparrot as xander and andrew, icecoldfrost as children4cash, wesleynotponcy as notagoodwatcher, and willbedone.]]