Hellmouth Recidivism 1 - #411 Aurochs
Title: Hellmouth Recidivism
Fandom: BtVS
Prompt: 411 - Aurochs
Words: 755
Warnings: Impalement
Rating: Teen
Summary: An older and wiser Xander has his soul placed in the body of an alternate universe version of himself who was vamped on Valentine's day.
Time Warp -
Magenta - "In another dimension, with voyeuristic intention, Well secluded, I see all."
RiffRaff - "With a bit of a mind flip"
Magenta - "You're into the time slip"
RiffRaff - "And nothing can ever be the same"
(We'll call this a practice round, b/c I misunderstood which prompt was open and this was last week's)
"Xander!" Faith cried, "The right flank can't hold the gate by themselves any longer. We need to fall back and regroup with the madjai."
"We haven't had a foothold situation with a hell or war god since Glory." He snarled back, using his axe to behead a priest who was trying to gut him with a ceremonial knife. "I'm not about to break that record now. Ishtar hasn't broken through the veil yet and the mages just need a little more time."
The ground shook underneath them and a resounding pounding echoed out from the Ishtar Gate. A deep voice boomed out: "If thou openest not the gate to let me enter, I will break the door, I will wrench the lock, I will smash the door-posts, I will force the doors. I will bring up the dead to eat the living. And the dead will outnumber the living."
They exchanged a glance over the fray and doubled their efforts, there was no way a Babylonian war goddess was taking over the world on their watch. Especially not if that was her campaign speech.
"Gods, I hate historians. Why in the Hellmouth did they have to make such an accurate reproduction of the gate?" He grumbled to himself as the priests intensified their attacks in religious fervor. The closer the goddess came to their plane the more power was being fed directly into her worshippers. "Seriously, just a few cut corners, that's all I'm asking next time. Shoddy building materials. A few missing or mistranslated runes. Anything! I hear scale models are all the rage."
Formations, NOW! Willow's urgent mental voice echoed among the collective force of native desert warriors and the imported Council members. Slowly, they obeyed, turning the battle and working their way to the edges of the combat zone and herding the warrior priests into the center, a killzone directly in line with the gate. They would be consumed by the spell aimed at the Ishtar Gate and the priests' life-force would power the barrier to keep her from breaking through. Because she was tied to all of her priests through the magicks she had bestowed upon them, Ishtar's power would effectively be looped in upon itself. The harder she pushed to escape the more her power would drain to keep her contained.
Xander visually checked over their group, taking a head count and making sure that all those he considered his own were out of the line of fire. Buffy and Dawn had formed a deadly duo over the years, the younger sister throwing deadly long range spells in every direction as her older sister cut down anyone who dared approach physically. He watched as Buffy bashed a cultist in the temple with the flat of her blade. Once Willow had given the call the whole team had switched to non-lethal attacks, they needed to feed as many of these guys as possible into the spell to lessen the toll such a large working would take on their magic users. Buffy caught his eye and nodded, they had reached their mark. He knew that Vi and Kennedy were in the rear guarding Willow's group and Andrew and Robin would still be in Baghdad at the National Archive.
Faith executed a truly impressive flip over the battle to her agreed upon position next to him and high kicked a priest that was about to stab Xander's blind side back into the killbox. We're clear, fire at will, Wills. Xander exchanged a brief smirk with the dark slayer over his pun, but his expression faltered as he caught movement over her shoulder. The golden bas-relief auroch on the gate behind her was pulling itself out of the glazed brickwork and had angled it's head to gore her with it's huge arched horns. Ishtar was finally close enough to have direct control of her power in their realm.
He had no time to think before he reacted, he just grabbed Faith by the shoulders and spun them both around. It was a sign of how much the years had built the trust between them that Faith didn't resist at all, and just went with his movement. He was still in an awkward half embrace with her as one large golden horn gouged through his back and splattered his blood across her horrified expression. The force of it shattered his ribs and drove all the way through him. He had just enough time to look down and see the horn emerging from his chest when the auroch tossed it's huge golden head and sent him flying.
He never even had a chance to land as the world turned into magic and fire. Willow's spell had been activated and he wasn't in the clear. He was right in the middle of it all.
----------------------------------------------------------------
Ishtar's bolded speech is taken directly from her Wiki page and was not counted in my word count. I thought it was appropriate to start TamingtheMuse with a goddess.
Fandom: BtVS
Prompt: 411 - Aurochs
Words: 755
Warnings: Impalement
Rating: Teen
Summary: An older and wiser Xander has his soul placed in the body of an alternate universe version of himself who was vamped on Valentine's day.
Time Warp -
Magenta - "In another dimension, with voyeuristic intention, Well secluded, I see all."
RiffRaff - "With a bit of a mind flip"
Magenta - "You're into the time slip"
RiffRaff - "And nothing can ever be the same"
(We'll call this a practice round, b/c I misunderstood which prompt was open and this was last week's)
"Xander!" Faith cried, "The right flank can't hold the gate by themselves any longer. We need to fall back and regroup with the madjai."
"We haven't had a foothold situation with a hell or war god since Glory." He snarled back, using his axe to behead a priest who was trying to gut him with a ceremonial knife. "I'm not about to break that record now. Ishtar hasn't broken through the veil yet and the mages just need a little more time."
The ground shook underneath them and a resounding pounding echoed out from the Ishtar Gate. A deep voice boomed out: "If thou openest not the gate to let me enter, I will break the door, I will wrench the lock, I will smash the door-posts, I will force the doors. I will bring up the dead to eat the living. And the dead will outnumber the living."
They exchanged a glance over the fray and doubled their efforts, there was no way a Babylonian war goddess was taking over the world on their watch. Especially not if that was her campaign speech.
"Gods, I hate historians. Why in the Hellmouth did they have to make such an accurate reproduction of the gate?" He grumbled to himself as the priests intensified their attacks in religious fervor. The closer the goddess came to their plane the more power was being fed directly into her worshippers. "Seriously, just a few cut corners, that's all I'm asking next time. Shoddy building materials. A few missing or mistranslated runes. Anything! I hear scale models are all the rage."
Formations, NOW! Willow's urgent mental voice echoed among the collective force of native desert warriors and the imported Council members. Slowly, they obeyed, turning the battle and working their way to the edges of the combat zone and herding the warrior priests into the center, a killzone directly in line with the gate. They would be consumed by the spell aimed at the Ishtar Gate and the priests' life-force would power the barrier to keep her from breaking through. Because she was tied to all of her priests through the magicks she had bestowed upon them, Ishtar's power would effectively be looped in upon itself. The harder she pushed to escape the more her power would drain to keep her contained.
Xander visually checked over their group, taking a head count and making sure that all those he considered his own were out of the line of fire. Buffy and Dawn had formed a deadly duo over the years, the younger sister throwing deadly long range spells in every direction as her older sister cut down anyone who dared approach physically. He watched as Buffy bashed a cultist in the temple with the flat of her blade. Once Willow had given the call the whole team had switched to non-lethal attacks, they needed to feed as many of these guys as possible into the spell to lessen the toll such a large working would take on their magic users. Buffy caught his eye and nodded, they had reached their mark. He knew that Vi and Kennedy were in the rear guarding Willow's group and Andrew and Robin would still be in Baghdad at the National Archive.
Faith executed a truly impressive flip over the battle to her agreed upon position next to him and high kicked a priest that was about to stab Xander's blind side back into the killbox. We're clear, fire at will, Wills. Xander exchanged a brief smirk with the dark slayer over his pun, but his expression faltered as he caught movement over her shoulder. The golden bas-relief auroch on the gate behind her was pulling itself out of the glazed brickwork and had angled it's head to gore her with it's huge arched horns. Ishtar was finally close enough to have direct control of her power in their realm.
He had no time to think before he reacted, he just grabbed Faith by the shoulders and spun them both around. It was a sign of how much the years had built the trust between them that Faith didn't resist at all, and just went with his movement. He was still in an awkward half embrace with her as one large golden horn gouged through his back and splattered his blood across her horrified expression. The force of it shattered his ribs and drove all the way through him. He had just enough time to look down and see the horn emerging from his chest when the auroch tossed it's huge golden head and sent him flying.
He never even had a chance to land as the world turned into magic and fire. Willow's spell had been activated and he wasn't in the clear. He was right in the middle of it all.
----------------------------------------------------------------
Ishtar's bolded speech is taken directly from her Wiki page and was not counted in my word count. I thought it was appropriate to start TamingtheMuse with a goddess.