New Sunnydale High School, Early May 2003 (The Next Day/Tuesday Fandom Time)
Morning came, and everyone armed up for the battle in...
It'd be nice and dramatic to say it was in silence, but it wasn't. The truth was, there was a constant nervous undercurrent of whispering from the Potentials, the clinks and thumps of weapons being passed out, the occasional awkward, blurted comment from Andrew or cheerful bit of bluntness from Anya, and through it all the Scoobies' trademark jokes-in-the-face-of-death.
Some army they made, walking through the streets of Sunnydale toward the Hellmouth: two Slayers, a Watcher, a one-armed carpenter, a witch, the son of a Slayer, an ex-demon, a former would-be supervillain with a penchant for comic book references, a teenager created from mystical energy, and a bunch of girls who'd been told they might be something special. This was what was standing between the First Evil and total destruction.
Kennedy thought it was pretty cool, actually.
"Welcome to Sunnydale High," called Robin as they approached the front doors. It had been his school; it seemed only appropriate to let him be the first one in. "There's no running in the halls, no yelling, and no gum. Apart from that we have only one rule."
He turned to face them, and threw the doors open. "If they move, kill 'em."
Kennedy grinned. Huge fight, going down at the high school? It was kind of like old times.
At Buffy's direction, Faith and Spike headed toward the basement with the Potentials trooping behind them, while Xander-- predictably and comfortingly-- called out that the bathroom was on the left if they needed to go, which they probably should if they thought about what they were about to face anyway.
Kennedy knew what her job was, and it made her almost wish she could be heading for the Seal with them. Almost. Well, she sort of would be; Robin's office was right above the Seal, and that was where she and Willow would be. Willow to work the spell, and Kennedy standing by to guard her, keep her grounded... kill her if she had to. The prospect of what the spell would do if it succeeded was only everything Kennedy had ever dreamed of. The consequences if it failed...
Kennedy swallowed, shut that thought down hard, and reached out to take the bag of magical supplies from Willow.
"I'll start getting you set up," she said, and headed into the principal's office. Behind her, echoing off the walls of the too-empty hallway, she heard Robin ordering the "civilian" combatants to hold down the three pathways that could let any of the Bringers or Ubervamps escape into the sewers: Xander and Dawn in the atrium, Anya and Andrew in the north hall, and he and Giles in the lounge. The last thing she caught before the door shut behind her was Andrew, starting to give a speech about being proud to die for this very special cause with them.
Kennedy set the bag down, opened it, and began to unpack, arranging candles and crystals and other paraphernalia around the room like she and Willow had spent most of the night going over. It was pretty funny: four years ago she hadn't even believed in magic, and now here she was, helping to prep for what was probably the most epic spell in the history of ever. Four years ago, if anyone had told her she'd be doing this, she would have laughed.
She'd come a long way since then, thanks in no small part to those two years in Fandom, so really, when it all came down to it, her friends still had her back here.
***
Her legs were burning.
Kennedy had been crouched here, across the circle from Willow, for... she didn't know how long now, breathing in the scent of the incense, watching as Willow's lips moved in a steady but inaudible chant in the flickering candlelight. It was the sort of atmosphere that could easily have put her to sleep. If she wasn't so tense, that was. She had no idea what was going on in the basement below them, no guarantee that this crazy gambit of theirs would pay off.
Willow sat there, hands on the Scythe, working her mojo; Kennedy stayed poised on the balls of her feet, watching and waiting, just close enough to grab that Scythe if she had to.
("You ready to kill me?" Willow had asked with a nervous laugh just before getting started.
Kennedy had just wanted to reach out and hold her, promise that wasn't going to happen. But she had made a promise of her own, so all she could say was, "Starting to be.")
Oh god, her muscles were starting to shake from the tension of holding this position for so long, and it was an incredibly unwelcome reminder of her own mortality. She didn't imagine it was different for any of the others, scattered throughout the school building. The chanting continued, and... nothing was happening yet. She just kept watching, searching Willow's face for any sign that things were going badly, and hoping like hell she wouldn't find one.
Then a sharp tingle of something ran up her spine.
"Willow?" she ventured, and got a warning look (already familiar, yes) of not now, sweetie for it. The light in the room wasn't flickering so much now. Instead it was building, coruscating into a steady glow that came from somewhere most definitely not the candles.
Willow tensed, her breath catching, and Kennedy's breath caught too.
"Oh my Goddess," Willow whispered, and the light swelled to a supernova wave that swept out, unstoppable, from the Scythe.
***
Rona
When the power swept through Rona she'd been expecting... fireworks. Music. Something loud and bombastic. Instead-- and it felt like it made so much sense-- it was more like a quiet peace, a sense of serenity like she'd never felt before. All the fear of the past several months? The reluctance to be part of the fight, the sense of futility?
Not gone, but suddenly not significant, either. Just obstacles that she felt she could knock over easily.
She'd made her choice, but with reservations.
Now?
Bring it, the First.
Vi
Vi was too swept up in the chaos of the fight to register the spell at first. There was nothing but her body and the stake and the monsters, and the other girls who fought and bled and fought again around her.
Then she fell back to catch her breath and realized that the air felt sharper, cleaner, that her muscles were singing.
Her hand tightened on the stake. She jumped into the air, seeing exactly how to bring down an uber-vamp.
They were going to win this one.
Chao-Ahn
Chao-Ahn actually knew more English than she let on; she'd been studying it fairly diligently since Giles had brought her to Sunnydale, but as hopeless as everything had been for most of her time here it had frequently been easier not to try, not to put the effort into translating the unfamiliar words into something more comprehensible.
Learning to fight had been much the same, especially under Kennedy's supervision: you either kept up, or you fell behind and struggled to follow along.
She'd always thought she could be good at it, if she could just make that last little cognitive connection.
The one that fell into place now as the spell took effect.
She understood, and understanding wasn't a terrifying prospect any more.
Amanda
Amanda, tall and gawky and awkward, had never felt completely at home in her own body. It was part of what made her so uncertain in social situations. She knew what she could do with her brain-- that had always been easy-- but getting her limbs to do exactly what she wanted just felt a touch out of sync, like her muscles couldn't quite keep up with what her synapses were telling them to do.
The night she'd dusted her first vampire in the hallways of the school, with Dawn's encouragement, she'd felt more comfortable in her own skin than she could ever remember. The feeling had been heady, but also elusive; all the training and lessons ever since finding out what she was had brought her close to that moment but never quite there, like the high C she kept working toward in swing choir vocal warmups but always fell short of by a note.
She smiled and tightened her grip on the sharpened staff in her hands as she felt something pass through her. Her brain and body had just found the same tempo, and it was time to make some beautiful, fighty music.
Caridad
In the past few weeks, Caridad had gone from the amazing high of "Dios, vampires and demons are real and I am special and meant to fight them" to crashing down to "We are all going to die." The loss of some of their own and Xander's horrible injury had turned the fantasy into chilling reality.
Real like this fight. Stake in hand, she struggled to remember everything Buffy and Kennedy had drilled into them and fight the monsters. She was aching and bleeding and afraid, but she wasn't going to give up.
Then the pain and fear faded, and it wasn't just adrenalin keeping her moving. She felt stronger. Faster. Practically invincible. It wasn't a struggle now to remember just how to move and fight one of the uber-vamps; she just knew.
And they were just getting started.
It was a million things all at once, and Kennedy got knocked over onto her back from the force of it all. She let out a wordless yell as her body tingled with the effects of the spell: lifetimes of Slayer memories and instincts, strength and speed flooding into her every nerve ending. For a moment she even thought she blacked out when her newly sharpened senses threatened to send her into overload.
It was amazing, like the best orgasm she'd ever had, the adrenaline rush of skydiving, the stomach-swooping giddiness of looking at the girl she loved, scoring the best Christmas present in the history of everything-- all of that at once and then something that went far beyond it all. The sense of being part of something far greater than herself, like this was where she belonged and this was what she was meant to be.
She lay there on the floor for several eternal seconds longer, catching her breath, and reeled back to her feet faster and more easily than she'd ever thought she could. And then she caught a glimpse of Willow, tears streaming down her face and a look of indescribable joy in her eyes as the power of the spell gripped her with a force that couldn't possibly be bad-- her hair had gone pure white-- and her breath caught again.
Oh, god, Tara, she thought, I wish you could see this now.
I knew you could do it, she wanted to say to Willow herself. I told you, didn't I?
Instead, what came out of her mouth, because she was still so caught up in the dizzying high of it all, was:
"You? Are a goddess."
It still said everything she wanted to say.
Willow slumped over, hair reverting to its normal red, and beamed at her in awed exhaustion. "And you're a Slayer." She held the Scythe out. "Get this to Buffy."
Kennedy could have kissed her then, out of relief and gratefulness and pride. But later. They'd have time for all the kisses in the world later. After the world didn't end, because right now she felt like she could take on everything and not even break a sweat.
She took the Scythe and ran.
Faith
Faith felt it the moment the spell hit. One second, wannabes, nervous, but doing their damnedest to hold the line. And the next ... the power just moved over them like a wave. They changed. Shoulders square, itching to go, praying more vamps showed up. They were Slayers. It was beautiful.
She'd been seventeen. It had been this rush -- no, just this certainty, where she knew everything was gonna be all right. No one was ever gonna be bigger or stronger than her again. No one could hurt her again. She was safe, and she even had a purpose. Like a comic book or something -- go kill bad guys, you get to be a superhero. It was the best feeling she'd had in her life.
And then she'd fucked it all up. So ... so much for that.
Everyone kept talking about the end of the world. But standing here, right now, Faith kind of thought maybe it was the beginning of something. Something big. There were a whole bunch of Slayers waking up, and that was going to change everything. They could accomplish shit together. Change the whole dynamic of the fight against evil.
Hell, maybe even she had a purpose in all of this, too. Maybe there was a spot for her in it somewhere.
Okay. She had her head together. She was going to suck it up and start being a good guy, even if that was fucking scary. No more hiding in prison. Time to start earning her redemption.
......... and fine. If she and the hot Principal actually made it out of here alive, then she was going to ask him on an actual, real, no bullshit date. But that was all she was promising, here, okay?
And now, back to paying attention to staking vamps before this stupid trip down Sappy Lane got her killed.
Buffy
Buffy hadn't doubted that the spell would work.
At least not until they'd walked in on a party full of Ubervamps and it was really hard not to panic, let alone stay unpetrified.
She already had her power. She didn't even remember a time when she felt getting it, or at least if she had, it'd bled into the whole Slayer thing so much that it seemed like she'd always had it. But she felt this. She could feel those girls getting strong, getting that power that probably would have otherwise been denied to them. It was fantastic.
Oh, and they were totally going to kick the First's ass now. That too.
Kennedy
Kennedy kept her fingers curled around the haft of the Scythe as she tore through the hallways, and holy shit she was so fast, it was amazing. She was almost disappointed that the trip from the office to the basement was so short; she could've exulted in the feeling of that newfound speed forever.
"Buffy, catch!" she yelled as she dropped through the Seal into the Hellmouth and threw the Scythe to her-- god, that was effortless, even with the solid weight of that thing. She watched it arc through the air, glinting in the light--
And whirled, her reactions impossibly quick, to catch an Ubervamp's arm as the thing barreled down at her. It slammed its free hand into her stomach and sent her spinning into the rock face, but she spun back, kicked it hard in the head, reveling in the sheer power of her own attack.
All around her the fighting kept on, Turok-Han swarming up out of the chasm and being beaten back by the Potentials-- no, Slayers. Rona, broken arm and all, was whaling on one with the kind of ferocity she'd never let loose before; Chao-Ahn was an absolute whirlwind; Caridad looked like she was born for this, which she was but she finally believed it; good goddamn, Vi was way fiercer than anyone would've bet on.
This was what some of them had been told most of their lives that they might, maybe, with a fraction of a chance, be. This was what they all were, now. Not just a dream or a possibility, but reality.
Kennedy laughed, wild and exhilarated, scooped up a fallen sword, and went to work.
Spike
Spike had been fighting, all fangs and fury, when there was a sudden tug in his chest.
Not a tug: A punch, like something inside was trying to fight its way out. He glanced down, bewildered even as another part of him knew. It was the medallion, and it was doing what it was meant to do.
He staggered and braced himself against a wall, feeling the energy in the necklace surge through him. The beam from it burst up and toward the sky, tearing through the cavern's top like tissue paper.
It wouldn't be long now, he realized as he surveyed the fight. Couldn't be. The power was incredible and awful and the whole world, burning away, right there on his chest.
Donne ran through head: One short sleep past, we wake eternally, and death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.
His eyes, though, sought out Buffy.
***
Kennedy had lost herself in the fight by the time a shaft of sunlight came bursting down through the cavern roof. She wasn't sure what had caused it, but when it swept through, temporarily blinding people and leaving piles of ash in its wake, the ground began to rumble and she knew even before Buffy and Faith started yelling that it was time to get out of there.
She didn't stop to see what was happening; she just leaped back up through the Seal opening and tore back toward the principal's office to get her girl. The spell had Willow completely wiped, still, but hey, that meant she had the super-shiny new super-strength to help her out of the building easily enough, even if it threatened to come down around them.
Everything was a blur for a while after that: helping the wounded pile into a nearby school bus at Giles's direction, getting people into seats, taking stock as Robin floored the pedal and pulled away. Pretty good driver for a guy with a serious stab wound.
Behind them, the town was falling into a crater, the bus keeping just ahead of the rolling edge of it as they sped through the streets and out onto the highway, but from where she sat holding onto Willow and scanning the faces of the people in the seats Kennedy hardly noticed. Amanda wasn't there, and neither were Spike or Anya, and the way Dawn was peering anxiously out the back window...
"Stay awake!" she heard Vi yell fiercely at a half-unconscious Rona as something hit the roof of the bus with a faint thud. "This is nothing! Look at me! This is nothing!"
Vi was going to be one hell of a Slayer. It showed.
When the bus finally screeched to a halt somewhere on the abandoned two-lane highway out of town, shortly after the ground stopped shaking, Kennedy saw Dawn throw the emergency exit door open and hurl herself bodily at Buffy, who'd just jumped off the roof. Up at the front of the bus, Faith crouched by Robin, slouched in the driver's seat, concern on her face for a few moments before she laughed in relief, then got off the bus to join Buffy and Dawn, along with Giles, Willow, Xander, and Andrew.
She wanted to join them too, and almost did, except that she realized at the last second what exactly they'd lost to that crater: years of memories, good and bad. Their entire lives, in some cases. They needed a moment-- though when she saw Andrew swallow before saying something to Xander, haltingly, that made Xander smile wistfully and clap his one good hand on the shorter boy's shoulder, she felt an awful twisting sensation in her own gut. Despite everything, despite her uncanny knack for deflating Kennedy's ego with just a few words, Anya's death left a hole in a place she'd actually liked being filled.
Then there was Spike, who wasn't going to get the chance to see if that future Kennedy had been rooting for, for him, was ever going to happen.
Her thoughts turned to Amanda from there, and to the others who hadn't made it out; for the moment the realization was mostly intellectual, the sort of thing where she knew she was supposed to be sad but there just wasn't room to feel it yet. Kennedy looked at the group outside on the edge of the crater for a moment longer, then stood and started walking down the aisle of the bus, occasionally pausing to help get one girl seated more comfortably, checking to see if another was going to be okay, exchanging nods and smiles with her fellow survivors.
Her fellow Slayers.
"Wow," Jorja finally spoke up with a tiny, relieved giggle. "We made it."
A soft buzz of murmured assent rippled through the bus.
"The world didn't end," came a voice from somewhere in the middle section.
"And we kick ass now," added another girl, who trailed off with an abashed laugh; Giana had never used a single expletive in the entire time she'd been in Sunnydale.
"And there's a lot of us. We might, like, even have time for a social life--"
"Oh my god, get out. A life? What's that?"
"So what does that mean for us after this?"
Kennedy looked out the bus's windshield at the stretch of open road ahead of them and grinned.
"Guess we're gonna find out, huh?"
[[nfi/nfb, ooc-okay, omg DONE DONE DONE DONE DONE! adapted, for the last time, from btvs 7x22, "chosen." (full disclosure, yes, i riffed off of the shooting script directions for some of the reactions to the spell.)
a huge round of thanks to my entire npc cast, whether or not they feature in this particular post: annieadderall as stillbaking, wesleynotponcy as notagoodwatcher, needsaparrot as xander and andrew, willbedone, regretiz4suckas as inthekeyofme, icecoldfrost as children4cash, life_inshadow as followshisblood and cutestripeyhat, trigons_child as ready_foraction, and angelo_wings as neverfaithful. relly gets extra thanks for keeping me sane over the last few weeks of this with some awesome behind-the-scenes help, but everyone gets immense thanks for being awesome and making this go a few surprising places that i never would've expected if i'd just written it all up by myself.
...okay, there'll be one more post tomorrow for an epilogue of sorts, but effectively, this monstrosity of a plot wraps up today. thanks for indulging my mostly-weekly spam for the past several months, y'all.]]
It'd be nice and dramatic to say it was in silence, but it wasn't. The truth was, there was a constant nervous undercurrent of whispering from the Potentials, the clinks and thumps of weapons being passed out, the occasional awkward, blurted comment from Andrew or cheerful bit of bluntness from Anya, and through it all the Scoobies' trademark jokes-in-the-face-of-death.
Some army they made, walking through the streets of Sunnydale toward the Hellmouth: two Slayers, a Watcher, a one-armed carpenter, a witch, the son of a Slayer, an ex-demon, a former would-be supervillain with a penchant for comic book references, a teenager created from mystical energy, and a bunch of girls who'd been told they might be something special. This was what was standing between the First Evil and total destruction.
Kennedy thought it was pretty cool, actually.
"Welcome to Sunnydale High," called Robin as they approached the front doors. It had been his school; it seemed only appropriate to let him be the first one in. "There's no running in the halls, no yelling, and no gum. Apart from that we have only one rule."
He turned to face them, and threw the doors open. "If they move, kill 'em."
Kennedy grinned. Huge fight, going down at the high school? It was kind of like old times.
At Buffy's direction, Faith and Spike headed toward the basement with the Potentials trooping behind them, while Xander-- predictably and comfortingly-- called out that the bathroom was on the left if they needed to go, which they probably should if they thought about what they were about to face anyway.
Kennedy knew what her job was, and it made her almost wish she could be heading for the Seal with them. Almost. Well, she sort of would be; Robin's office was right above the Seal, and that was where she and Willow would be. Willow to work the spell, and Kennedy standing by to guard her, keep her grounded... kill her if she had to. The prospect of what the spell would do if it succeeded was only everything Kennedy had ever dreamed of. The consequences if it failed...
Kennedy swallowed, shut that thought down hard, and reached out to take the bag of magical supplies from Willow.
"I'll start getting you set up," she said, and headed into the principal's office. Behind her, echoing off the walls of the too-empty hallway, she heard Robin ordering the "civilian" combatants to hold down the three pathways that could let any of the Bringers or Ubervamps escape into the sewers: Xander and Dawn in the atrium, Anya and Andrew in the north hall, and he and Giles in the lounge. The last thing she caught before the door shut behind her was Andrew, starting to give a speech about being proud to die for this very special cause with them.
Kennedy set the bag down, opened it, and began to unpack, arranging candles and crystals and other paraphernalia around the room like she and Willow had spent most of the night going over. It was pretty funny: four years ago she hadn't even believed in magic, and now here she was, helping to prep for what was probably the most epic spell in the history of ever. Four years ago, if anyone had told her she'd be doing this, she would have laughed.
She'd come a long way since then, thanks in no small part to those two years in Fandom, so really, when it all came down to it, her friends still had her back here.
***
Her legs were burning.
Kennedy had been crouched here, across the circle from Willow, for... she didn't know how long now, breathing in the scent of the incense, watching as Willow's lips moved in a steady but inaudible chant in the flickering candlelight. It was the sort of atmosphere that could easily have put her to sleep. If she wasn't so tense, that was. She had no idea what was going on in the basement below them, no guarantee that this crazy gambit of theirs would pay off.
Willow sat there, hands on the Scythe, working her mojo; Kennedy stayed poised on the balls of her feet, watching and waiting, just close enough to grab that Scythe if she had to.
("You ready to kill me?" Willow had asked with a nervous laugh just before getting started.
Kennedy had just wanted to reach out and hold her, promise that wasn't going to happen. But she had made a promise of her own, so all she could say was, "Starting to be.")
Oh god, her muscles were starting to shake from the tension of holding this position for so long, and it was an incredibly unwelcome reminder of her own mortality. She didn't imagine it was different for any of the others, scattered throughout the school building. The chanting continued, and... nothing was happening yet. She just kept watching, searching Willow's face for any sign that things were going badly, and hoping like hell she wouldn't find one.
Then a sharp tingle of something ran up her spine.
"Willow?" she ventured, and got a warning look (already familiar, yes) of not now, sweetie for it. The light in the room wasn't flickering so much now. Instead it was building, coruscating into a steady glow that came from somewhere most definitely not the candles.
Willow tensed, her breath catching, and Kennedy's breath caught too.
"Oh my Goddess," Willow whispered, and the light swelled to a supernova wave that swept out, unstoppable, from the Scythe.
***
Rona
When the power swept through Rona she'd been expecting... fireworks. Music. Something loud and bombastic. Instead-- and it felt like it made so much sense-- it was more like a quiet peace, a sense of serenity like she'd never felt before. All the fear of the past several months? The reluctance to be part of the fight, the sense of futility?
Not gone, but suddenly not significant, either. Just obstacles that she felt she could knock over easily.
She'd made her choice, but with reservations.
Now?
Bring it, the First.
Vi
Vi was too swept up in the chaos of the fight to register the spell at first. There was nothing but her body and the stake and the monsters, and the other girls who fought and bled and fought again around her.
Then she fell back to catch her breath and realized that the air felt sharper, cleaner, that her muscles were singing.
Her hand tightened on the stake. She jumped into the air, seeing exactly how to bring down an uber-vamp.
They were going to win this one.
Chao-Ahn
Chao-Ahn actually knew more English than she let on; she'd been studying it fairly diligently since Giles had brought her to Sunnydale, but as hopeless as everything had been for most of her time here it had frequently been easier not to try, not to put the effort into translating the unfamiliar words into something more comprehensible.
Learning to fight had been much the same, especially under Kennedy's supervision: you either kept up, or you fell behind and struggled to follow along.
She'd always thought she could be good at it, if she could just make that last little cognitive connection.
The one that fell into place now as the spell took effect.
She understood, and understanding wasn't a terrifying prospect any more.
Amanda
Amanda, tall and gawky and awkward, had never felt completely at home in her own body. It was part of what made her so uncertain in social situations. She knew what she could do with her brain-- that had always been easy-- but getting her limbs to do exactly what she wanted just felt a touch out of sync, like her muscles couldn't quite keep up with what her synapses were telling them to do.
The night she'd dusted her first vampire in the hallways of the school, with Dawn's encouragement, she'd felt more comfortable in her own skin than she could ever remember. The feeling had been heady, but also elusive; all the training and lessons ever since finding out what she was had brought her close to that moment but never quite there, like the high C she kept working toward in swing choir vocal warmups but always fell short of by a note.
She smiled and tightened her grip on the sharpened staff in her hands as she felt something pass through her. Her brain and body had just found the same tempo, and it was time to make some beautiful, fighty music.
Caridad
In the past few weeks, Caridad had gone from the amazing high of "Dios, vampires and demons are real and I am special and meant to fight them" to crashing down to "We are all going to die." The loss of some of their own and Xander's horrible injury had turned the fantasy into chilling reality.
Real like this fight. Stake in hand, she struggled to remember everything Buffy and Kennedy had drilled into them and fight the monsters. She was aching and bleeding and afraid, but she wasn't going to give up.
Then the pain and fear faded, and it wasn't just adrenalin keeping her moving. She felt stronger. Faster. Practically invincible. It wasn't a struggle now to remember just how to move and fight one of the uber-vamps; she just knew.
And they were just getting started.
It was a million things all at once, and Kennedy got knocked over onto her back from the force of it all. She let out a wordless yell as her body tingled with the effects of the spell: lifetimes of Slayer memories and instincts, strength and speed flooding into her every nerve ending. For a moment she even thought she blacked out when her newly sharpened senses threatened to send her into overload.
It was amazing, like the best orgasm she'd ever had, the adrenaline rush of skydiving, the stomach-swooping giddiness of looking at the girl she loved, scoring the best Christmas present in the history of everything-- all of that at once and then something that went far beyond it all. The sense of being part of something far greater than herself, like this was where she belonged and this was what she was meant to be.
She lay there on the floor for several eternal seconds longer, catching her breath, and reeled back to her feet faster and more easily than she'd ever thought she could. And then she caught a glimpse of Willow, tears streaming down her face and a look of indescribable joy in her eyes as the power of the spell gripped her with a force that couldn't possibly be bad-- her hair had gone pure white-- and her breath caught again.
Oh, god, Tara, she thought, I wish you could see this now.
I knew you could do it, she wanted to say to Willow herself. I told you, didn't I?
Instead, what came out of her mouth, because she was still so caught up in the dizzying high of it all, was:
"You? Are a goddess."
It still said everything she wanted to say.
Willow slumped over, hair reverting to its normal red, and beamed at her in awed exhaustion. "And you're a Slayer." She held the Scythe out. "Get this to Buffy."
Kennedy could have kissed her then, out of relief and gratefulness and pride. But later. They'd have time for all the kisses in the world later. After the world didn't end, because right now she felt like she could take on everything and not even break a sweat.
She took the Scythe and ran.
Faith
Faith felt it the moment the spell hit. One second, wannabes, nervous, but doing their damnedest to hold the line. And the next ... the power just moved over them like a wave. They changed. Shoulders square, itching to go, praying more vamps showed up. They were Slayers. It was beautiful.
She'd been seventeen. It had been this rush -- no, just this certainty, where she knew everything was gonna be all right. No one was ever gonna be bigger or stronger than her again. No one could hurt her again. She was safe, and she even had a purpose. Like a comic book or something -- go kill bad guys, you get to be a superhero. It was the best feeling she'd had in her life.
And then she'd fucked it all up. So ... so much for that.
Everyone kept talking about the end of the world. But standing here, right now, Faith kind of thought maybe it was the beginning of something. Something big. There were a whole bunch of Slayers waking up, and that was going to change everything. They could accomplish shit together. Change the whole dynamic of the fight against evil.
Hell, maybe even she had a purpose in all of this, too. Maybe there was a spot for her in it somewhere.
Okay. She had her head together. She was going to suck it up and start being a good guy, even if that was fucking scary. No more hiding in prison. Time to start earning her redemption.
......... and fine. If she and the hot Principal actually made it out of here alive, then she was going to ask him on an actual, real, no bullshit date. But that was all she was promising, here, okay?
And now, back to paying attention to staking vamps before this stupid trip down Sappy Lane got her killed.
Buffy
Buffy hadn't doubted that the spell would work.
At least not until they'd walked in on a party full of Ubervamps and it was really hard not to panic, let alone stay unpetrified.
She already had her power. She didn't even remember a time when she felt getting it, or at least if she had, it'd bled into the whole Slayer thing so much that it seemed like she'd always had it. But she felt this. She could feel those girls getting strong, getting that power that probably would have otherwise been denied to them. It was fantastic.
Oh, and they were totally going to kick the First's ass now. That too.
Kennedy
Kennedy kept her fingers curled around the haft of the Scythe as she tore through the hallways, and holy shit she was so fast, it was amazing. She was almost disappointed that the trip from the office to the basement was so short; she could've exulted in the feeling of that newfound speed forever.
"Buffy, catch!" she yelled as she dropped through the Seal into the Hellmouth and threw the Scythe to her-- god, that was effortless, even with the solid weight of that thing. She watched it arc through the air, glinting in the light--
And whirled, her reactions impossibly quick, to catch an Ubervamp's arm as the thing barreled down at her. It slammed its free hand into her stomach and sent her spinning into the rock face, but she spun back, kicked it hard in the head, reveling in the sheer power of her own attack.
All around her the fighting kept on, Turok-Han swarming up out of the chasm and being beaten back by the Potentials-- no, Slayers. Rona, broken arm and all, was whaling on one with the kind of ferocity she'd never let loose before; Chao-Ahn was an absolute whirlwind; Caridad looked like she was born for this, which she was but she finally believed it; good goddamn, Vi was way fiercer than anyone would've bet on.
This was what some of them had been told most of their lives that they might, maybe, with a fraction of a chance, be. This was what they all were, now. Not just a dream or a possibility, but reality.
Kennedy laughed, wild and exhilarated, scooped up a fallen sword, and went to work.
Spike
Spike had been fighting, all fangs and fury, when there was a sudden tug in his chest.
Not a tug: A punch, like something inside was trying to fight its way out. He glanced down, bewildered even as another part of him knew. It was the medallion, and it was doing what it was meant to do.
He staggered and braced himself against a wall, feeling the energy in the necklace surge through him. The beam from it burst up and toward the sky, tearing through the cavern's top like tissue paper.
It wouldn't be long now, he realized as he surveyed the fight. Couldn't be. The power was incredible and awful and the whole world, burning away, right there on his chest.
Donne ran through head: One short sleep past, we wake eternally, and death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.
His eyes, though, sought out Buffy.
***
Kennedy had lost herself in the fight by the time a shaft of sunlight came bursting down through the cavern roof. She wasn't sure what had caused it, but when it swept through, temporarily blinding people and leaving piles of ash in its wake, the ground began to rumble and she knew even before Buffy and Faith started yelling that it was time to get out of there.
She didn't stop to see what was happening; she just leaped back up through the Seal opening and tore back toward the principal's office to get her girl. The spell had Willow completely wiped, still, but hey, that meant she had the super-shiny new super-strength to help her out of the building easily enough, even if it threatened to come down around them.
Everything was a blur for a while after that: helping the wounded pile into a nearby school bus at Giles's direction, getting people into seats, taking stock as Robin floored the pedal and pulled away. Pretty good driver for a guy with a serious stab wound.
Behind them, the town was falling into a crater, the bus keeping just ahead of the rolling edge of it as they sped through the streets and out onto the highway, but from where she sat holding onto Willow and scanning the faces of the people in the seats Kennedy hardly noticed. Amanda wasn't there, and neither were Spike or Anya, and the way Dawn was peering anxiously out the back window...
"Stay awake!" she heard Vi yell fiercely at a half-unconscious Rona as something hit the roof of the bus with a faint thud. "This is nothing! Look at me! This is nothing!"
Vi was going to be one hell of a Slayer. It showed.
When the bus finally screeched to a halt somewhere on the abandoned two-lane highway out of town, shortly after the ground stopped shaking, Kennedy saw Dawn throw the emergency exit door open and hurl herself bodily at Buffy, who'd just jumped off the roof. Up at the front of the bus, Faith crouched by Robin, slouched in the driver's seat, concern on her face for a few moments before she laughed in relief, then got off the bus to join Buffy and Dawn, along with Giles, Willow, Xander, and Andrew.
She wanted to join them too, and almost did, except that she realized at the last second what exactly they'd lost to that crater: years of memories, good and bad. Their entire lives, in some cases. They needed a moment-- though when she saw Andrew swallow before saying something to Xander, haltingly, that made Xander smile wistfully and clap his one good hand on the shorter boy's shoulder, she felt an awful twisting sensation in her own gut. Despite everything, despite her uncanny knack for deflating Kennedy's ego with just a few words, Anya's death left a hole in a place she'd actually liked being filled.
Then there was Spike, who wasn't going to get the chance to see if that future Kennedy had been rooting for, for him, was ever going to happen.
Her thoughts turned to Amanda from there, and to the others who hadn't made it out; for the moment the realization was mostly intellectual, the sort of thing where she knew she was supposed to be sad but there just wasn't room to feel it yet. Kennedy looked at the group outside on the edge of the crater for a moment longer, then stood and started walking down the aisle of the bus, occasionally pausing to help get one girl seated more comfortably, checking to see if another was going to be okay, exchanging nods and smiles with her fellow survivors.
Her fellow Slayers.
"Wow," Jorja finally spoke up with a tiny, relieved giggle. "We made it."
A soft buzz of murmured assent rippled through the bus.
"The world didn't end," came a voice from somewhere in the middle section.
"And we kick ass now," added another girl, who trailed off with an abashed laugh; Giana had never used a single expletive in the entire time she'd been in Sunnydale.
"And there's a lot of us. We might, like, even have time for a social life--"
"Oh my god, get out. A life? What's that?"
"So what does that mean for us after this?"
Kennedy looked out the bus's windshield at the stretch of open road ahead of them and grinned.
"Guess we're gonna find out, huh?"
[[nfi/nfb, ooc-okay, omg DONE DONE DONE DONE DONE! adapted, for the last time, from btvs 7x22, "chosen." (full disclosure, yes, i riffed off of the shooting script directions for some of the reactions to the spell.)
a huge round of thanks to my entire npc cast, whether or not they feature in this particular post: annieadderall as stillbaking, wesleynotponcy as notagoodwatcher, needsaparrot as xander and andrew, willbedone, regretiz4suckas as inthekeyofme, icecoldfrost as children4cash, life_inshadow as followshisblood and cutestripeyhat, trigons_child as ready_foraction, and angelo_wings as neverfaithful. relly gets extra thanks for keeping me sane over the last few weeks of this with some awesome behind-the-scenes help, but everyone gets immense thanks for being awesome and making this go a few surprising places that i never would've expected if i'd just written it all up by myself.
...okay, there'll be one more post tomorrow for an epilogue of sorts, but effectively, this monstrosity of a plot wraps up today. thanks for indulging my mostly-weekly spam for the past several months, y'all.]]