The Rose, Part 20 (Buffy the Vampire Slayer)
Story: The Rose
Author: coalitiongirl
Chapter: 20
Series: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Completed? Updated most Tuesdays and Thursdays, and sometimes other times, too.
Pairings: Go here for the pairings list beyond Spike/Buffy. Consider them all spoilers, though.
Disclaimer: Characters and concepts belong to Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy. The plot is my own.
Summary: The Watchers Academy- where young potential slayers and watchers go to train in demonology, magic, and combat so that they can someday fight vampires, demons, and the forces of evil. There are evil magic professors, a principal with a secret, and an unbreachable wall between the slayers and the watchers. And in the basement, imprisoned vampires scheme and dream of destroying them all...
Reference Charts
Previous Chapters
Notes: Thank you again to those of you who read here! Your comments and support are amazing, and I really appreciate it. :) Turns out this drabbling thing isn't much to my liking (I want to write stories, dammit! Not scenes! :D), so if you prompted one, it might not be written until the end of the week. :( Thursday should bring another Rose update, though!
*******************************
“Hi!” she said brightly. “How are you?”
“W-Willow?” Tara’s voice was tinny and bewildered from the other side of the phone line. “I-Is that you?”
“Of course it is! Would anyone else be calling from a Sunnydale area code?”
“I guess not,” Tara said, still sounding perplexed. “Um…”
“We did exchange phone numbers, and I said I’d call you,” Willow reminded her. “I missed you.”
“I m-missed you, too,” Tara said, almost shyly. “How is everything?”
“Not bad.” It had been almost two weeks since they’d gotten home, and things were moving along smoothly. Willow was working on the optional research project during most of her free time, and Jesse and Xander seemed to be enjoying doing absolutely nothing, no matter how much she disapproved of it. Boys would be boys, it seemed. “Hey, I’m trying to weave together my own spell!” she remembered. “Like Ethan taught us in class! It’s going to be a sating spell, so an attacking vamp will suddenly think he’s really full and collapse or leave.”
There was a short silence on the other line before Tara spoke again, her voice low and disapproving. “You’re manipulating minds?”
“It’s vampires, Tara. They’re monsters anyway.” She shouldn’t have mentioned it to Tara, not when Tara had all those rigid beliefs about light and dark magic. Truthfully, she’d always admired that in Tara…so long as it didn’t interfere with the magic Willow was trying. And Ethan said that Willow was the top student in the year, and that she had no limits, so why was she worrying what Tara thought? “You told me that you do it with your animals at home, too.”
“I give them the sensation of tiredness, yes,” Tara agreed. “But that’s a physical feeling, not a thought, and they’re not even sentient. There’s no manipulation if there’s no sentient mind to manipulate. Demons aren’t animals.”
“Is this about…?” Her voice trailed off as she remembered what Tara had told her last year, about how she’d come to the Academy believing that she was a demon. Only after Miss Calendar had mentioned that the white magic they were using one day wouldn’t work for dark creatures did she begin to suspect otherwise, and she’d worked with both Giles and Miss Calendar until she finally believed it herself. “But you’re not.”
“It’s not about that. It’s about control, and power, and…never mind. Let’s save it for school.” Tara heaved a sigh. “It doesn’t matter right now.”
“Okay.” There was an awkward silence, during which Willow vowed not to bring up her summer project in front of Tara again, not until Ethan had seen and approved it. “Um… so how’s life at home?”
“F-fine.” There was that stutter again, the one that Willow hadn’t heard for years, and it worried her. “Everything’s j-just like it was when I l-left.”
“I know what you mean,” Willow agreed. “One second, we’re out there in England, adults or something like it, and then we get home and see our parents and we’re back to those little eight-year-olds we used to be. I’m not even staying with my family and I’m already in the mode of ‘tell me what to do’ and ‘ice cream for dinner’ and ‘boys are icky.’”
Tara laughed softly. “Boys are icky?”
Willow grinned. “Well, then I remember Oz and how sweet he is, how much I love him, and Oz? Oz!” Her mouth fell open as she stared at the living room door.
“Willow?” Tara asked curiously.
“I have to go,” she said breathlessly, setting the phone down on its receiver and spinning around to greet her guest. “Oz!”
Oz smiled at her from the doorway, a knapsack slung over one shoulder and his guitar case under the other arm. “Hey, Will.”
She nearly bowled him over with a hug. “How’d you get here? I mean, why? Well, I know why- or I hope I know why, and you said you might be visiting us this summer, but you’re here! Oz!”
“My folks are staying in LA,” Oz explained. “I hitched a ride here to see you.” His lips tasted like chapstick, warm and comforting in their familiarity. “I missed you.”
She melted into his embrace, sighing peacefully. “I love you, Oz.”
Boys are icky, indeed. What was I thinking?
--
“And this is the Bronze!” Xander announced to a politely interested Oz. “Where guys pick up Willow and she always says no, because if her boyfriend finds out, he’s going to kick their asses.”
“Except that one guy,” Jesse corrected him.
“Which one?”
“The one from last week? The big one who beat you at pool?”
Xander winced. “That one doesn’t count. I’m pretty sure that he wanted to dance with me.”
“Sounds like he was a catch,” Oz said, straight-faced.
Xander grinned, shaking his head. “Nah, he wasn’t my type.” He thought back to the school, to the girls he knew there. “Too blond.”
“I thought you had a crush on Buffy?” Willow raised her eyebrows. “I had such high hopes for you two. We could double-date and everything.”
Xander shrugged. “I wouldn’t say no to Buffy…but then, I’m a teenage boy. I probably wouldn’t say no to Cordy.”
“Like you could get her,” Jesse scoffed, but he was getting that uncomfortable look that always popped up when they talked about Cordelia. Jesse really hated her. Or something like that. “She’s way out of your league.”
“Well, there’s always Cari and Colleen,” Willow said, giving them both a dirty look. “Have fun with your slayer-obsession. Oz and I are going to dance.”
“It’s not like we like them because they’re slayers,” Xander said sulkily. “Our options are just really limited. It’s either Faith or runs-with-scissors Sheila Martini.”
Jesse gave him an odd look. “Faith?”
Thankfully, they were interrupted by a guy who hustled past them, nearly knocking Jesse over in the process. “Watch it!” Jesse called after him. The guy turned to sneer at them, his face changing suddenly as he flashed yellow eyes and a mangled brow in their direction in warning.
Xander stared. “Uh, Jesse?”
“Yeah?” Jesse sounded just as shaken.
“Was that a vampire?”
“Think so.”
Ahead of them, the vampire was talking to an older girl dressed in a skimpy red dress, his hands on her waist as they swayed to the music. He motioned toward the back door and she nodded, moving with it in that direction.
“He’s going to kill her,” Xander noted, a cold chill running through him. “We’ve got to stop him.”
He started toward the exit, but Jesse grabbed his arm warningly. “Xan, all we’re going to do is become vamp food out there! We’re not slayers!”
“Screw slayers.” Xander’s jaw tightened. “We’re that girl’s only chance right now, and I’m not just going to let her die because we’re not good enough. Are you coming or not?”
He was barely aware of Jesse’s protests, his eyes on the door and what awaited them behind it. It didn’t matter here if he’d failed his finals, if his father and teachers and Faith all thought that he was useless. Giles said that he could fight in a team of watchers, that he was brave and capable enough to make a difference. And this was going to be his first real test.
There was a pile of stakes lying right next to the exit when he opened the door, odd in other towns but the norm in this one. In fact, the one he picked up was a garish red and had I survived the Hellmouth™ inscribed on it in an eerie script. He tested it against his finger to ensure that it was made of wood. You never knew with these things.
A muffled cry jerked him from his perusal of the stake, and he jolted, spun, and hurtled toward the vampire at top speed, surprising it enough that it dropped the girl and turned to stare at Xander in surprise. “Run!” Xander yelled, angling the stake and attempting to thrust it forward.
The vampire scowled, knocking it aside. “I hate the boys. They’ve got a miserable taste.” Even so, it grabbed Xander by the neck of his t-shirt, shoving him against the wall roughly.
“Hey!” Jesse howled, running at them. “Get off of him!” The vampire snorted, lashing at Jesse with a foot. Jesse fell and scrambled back up, jumping onto the creature’s back and stabbing over his shoulder at the heart with desperate thrusts. The vampire grunted with annoyance and shook him off.
Xander kicked frantically at the vampire’s gut, shuddering as its teeth drew near his neck. Just a little closer, and…
And then the vampire was torn away from him and he fell to the ground in a heap, staring upwards in shocked relief. Had Jesse…?
But no, it was a tall girl with pale blond hair and cold blue eyes. “Little boys?” she said incredulously. “What, is there a shortage of pretty co-eds in town tonight?”
“Slayer,” the vampire choked out, its eyes glittering.
She kicked at him in a classic martial arts pose, staking him midway and propelling herself through the scattering dust off the wall and back to a stiff stance opposite them. “New to Sunnydale?” She raised an eyebrow. “Don’t hang out in the alleys. All kinds of nasty things here.”
“You’re the slayer?” Xander asked doubtfully, studying her with a frown. Come to think of it, she did look vaguely familiar, the way that some of the older watchers who’d graduated and came back to the Academy to visit did.
She stared at him. “Academy?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m Narra.” She turned to go. “Don’t play hero, watchers. Not here, not ever.”
She was gone before Xander could respond, and he stood unsteadily, exhilaration combining with raw fear to create a rush that made him dizzy with adrenaline. “We’ve got to do that again.”
--
“Hi, Giles!” Buffy said brightly, taking a seat next to him on the boardwalk bench.
“How are you?” Faith said with equal enthusiasm, plopping down on the other side. “Anya been treating you well?”
“She mention anything interesting?”
“About Buffy? And what Anya thinks is best for her training?”
Buffy mock-shuddered. “I’d hate to think that she’d be upset with you if you didn’t heed her advice. She’s sensitive about these things.”
“Very sensitive,” Faith emphasized, shaking her head in false concern. “Don’t you agree, Buffy?”
“Absolutely, Faith.”
Giles rubbed his temples. “Buffy, you can’t fight Spike again. Not at this level of your training.”
“But he can be my training!” Buffy protested. “How better to learn to beat master vampires than to train with master vampires?”
Giles sighed. “You had to be hospitalized last time.”
“And look at me now. I’m right as rain, as you British people say. Hey! You know who else is British?”
Faith rubbed her head thoughtfully. “Could it be that vampire you fought before the summer? I remember that fight. Gunn said that you were unbelievable, fighting better than you have in ages. What was the vampire’s name? Something with an S…S…Sp…”
“Alright!” Giles shook his head. “I’ll consider it.”
“Thank you, Giles!” Buffy gave him a hug. It was a calculated gesture, since all the slayers knew that hugs left Giles flustering and vaguely pleased, and Faith watched with a smirk. She’d never hug Giles, of course. It wasn’t her style. But Buffy used it to her advantage whenever it suited her, and sometimes just because. “You’re the greatest!”
They descended the boardwalk back toward the surf together. “Thanks for backing me up.”
Faith shrugged. “That’s what I do, you know that.”
“Yeah.” She gave Faith a smile. “I’m going to fight him again,” she said slowly, her smile widening. “Next time, we’ll ask Anya to come-“ Faith shaded her eyes to peer back at Giles. Anya was already sitting with him there, her head resting on his shoulder in a way that would have been sweet if Giles hadn’t been so damn old. “-And Giles will have to agree.”
“I’m sure.”
Buffy stopped to look at her. “Listen, I know you don’t want to talk about it…but would you want to fight Kakistos?”
“Who? Oh, yeah. Him.” Faith hadn’t given him much thought, not after she’d met Angelus. She had more important things to consider. Like the barrier spell, and how she was going to take it down.
She’d found out quickly enough that the barrier had been instituted a few years before, the work of, of all people, Mr. Wyndham-Pryce. Lucky for her, that meant that all the research material was readily available. Unfortunately, she was no researcher, and at this point, she was seriously considering somehow conning Willow into helping her take it down. Much as she hated to admit it, it was time to accept that she couldn’t do it alone.
“Nah, I don’t care about him,” she said flippantly. She had a far more important vampire to worry about now, anyway.
Look at us, she mused, Two slayers with two separate goals concerning two separate vampires. It did sound a bit morbid. But at least her goal wasn’t dangerous like Buffy’s…
No, she just wanted to get closer to Angelus. No fighting or injuries necessary.
***************
(To be notified when I update this fic, hit "Track Comments" below and select "rose" from the keywords, then pick how you want to be contacted.)
Next
Author: coalitiongirl
Chapter: 20
Series: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Completed? Updated most Tuesdays and Thursdays, and sometimes other times, too.
Pairings: Go here for the pairings list beyond Spike/Buffy. Consider them all spoilers, though.
Disclaimer: Characters and concepts belong to Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy. The plot is my own.
Summary: The Watchers Academy- where young potential slayers and watchers go to train in demonology, magic, and combat so that they can someday fight vampires, demons, and the forces of evil. There are evil magic professors, a principal with a secret, and an unbreachable wall between the slayers and the watchers. And in the basement, imprisoned vampires scheme and dream of destroying them all...
Reference Charts
Previous Chapters
Notes: Thank you again to those of you who read here! Your comments and support are amazing, and I really appreciate it. :) Turns out this drabbling thing isn't much to my liking (I want to write stories, dammit! Not scenes! :D), so if you prompted one, it might not be written until the end of the week. :( Thursday should bring another Rose update, though!
*******************************
“Hi!” she said brightly. “How are you?”
“W-Willow?” Tara’s voice was tinny and bewildered from the other side of the phone line. “I-Is that you?”
“Of course it is! Would anyone else be calling from a Sunnydale area code?”
“I guess not,” Tara said, still sounding perplexed. “Um…”
“We did exchange phone numbers, and I said I’d call you,” Willow reminded her. “I missed you.”
“I m-missed you, too,” Tara said, almost shyly. “How is everything?”
“Not bad.” It had been almost two weeks since they’d gotten home, and things were moving along smoothly. Willow was working on the optional research project during most of her free time, and Jesse and Xander seemed to be enjoying doing absolutely nothing, no matter how much she disapproved of it. Boys would be boys, it seemed. “Hey, I’m trying to weave together my own spell!” she remembered. “Like Ethan taught us in class! It’s going to be a sating spell, so an attacking vamp will suddenly think he’s really full and collapse or leave.”
There was a short silence on the other line before Tara spoke again, her voice low and disapproving. “You’re manipulating minds?”
“It’s vampires, Tara. They’re monsters anyway.” She shouldn’t have mentioned it to Tara, not when Tara had all those rigid beliefs about light and dark magic. Truthfully, she’d always admired that in Tara…so long as it didn’t interfere with the magic Willow was trying. And Ethan said that Willow was the top student in the year, and that she had no limits, so why was she worrying what Tara thought? “You told me that you do it with your animals at home, too.”
“I give them the sensation of tiredness, yes,” Tara agreed. “But that’s a physical feeling, not a thought, and they’re not even sentient. There’s no manipulation if there’s no sentient mind to manipulate. Demons aren’t animals.”
“Is this about…?” Her voice trailed off as she remembered what Tara had told her last year, about how she’d come to the Academy believing that she was a demon. Only after Miss Calendar had mentioned that the white magic they were using one day wouldn’t work for dark creatures did she begin to suspect otherwise, and she’d worked with both Giles and Miss Calendar until she finally believed it herself. “But you’re not.”
“It’s not about that. It’s about control, and power, and…never mind. Let’s save it for school.” Tara heaved a sigh. “It doesn’t matter right now.”
“Okay.” There was an awkward silence, during which Willow vowed not to bring up her summer project in front of Tara again, not until Ethan had seen and approved it. “Um… so how’s life at home?”
“F-fine.” There was that stutter again, the one that Willow hadn’t heard for years, and it worried her. “Everything’s j-just like it was when I l-left.”
“I know what you mean,” Willow agreed. “One second, we’re out there in England, adults or something like it, and then we get home and see our parents and we’re back to those little eight-year-olds we used to be. I’m not even staying with my family and I’m already in the mode of ‘tell me what to do’ and ‘ice cream for dinner’ and ‘boys are icky.’”
Tara laughed softly. “Boys are icky?”
Willow grinned. “Well, then I remember Oz and how sweet he is, how much I love him, and Oz? Oz!” Her mouth fell open as she stared at the living room door.
“Willow?” Tara asked curiously.
“I have to go,” she said breathlessly, setting the phone down on its receiver and spinning around to greet her guest. “Oz!”
Oz smiled at her from the doorway, a knapsack slung over one shoulder and his guitar case under the other arm. “Hey, Will.”
She nearly bowled him over with a hug. “How’d you get here? I mean, why? Well, I know why- or I hope I know why, and you said you might be visiting us this summer, but you’re here! Oz!”
“My folks are staying in LA,” Oz explained. “I hitched a ride here to see you.” His lips tasted like chapstick, warm and comforting in their familiarity. “I missed you.”
She melted into his embrace, sighing peacefully. “I love you, Oz.”
Boys are icky, indeed. What was I thinking?
--
“And this is the Bronze!” Xander announced to a politely interested Oz. “Where guys pick up Willow and she always says no, because if her boyfriend finds out, he’s going to kick their asses.”
“Except that one guy,” Jesse corrected him.
“Which one?”
“The one from last week? The big one who beat you at pool?”
Xander winced. “That one doesn’t count. I’m pretty sure that he wanted to dance with me.”
“Sounds like he was a catch,” Oz said, straight-faced.
Xander grinned, shaking his head. “Nah, he wasn’t my type.” He thought back to the school, to the girls he knew there. “Too blond.”
“I thought you had a crush on Buffy?” Willow raised her eyebrows. “I had such high hopes for you two. We could double-date and everything.”
Xander shrugged. “I wouldn’t say no to Buffy…but then, I’m a teenage boy. I probably wouldn’t say no to Cordy.”
“Like you could get her,” Jesse scoffed, but he was getting that uncomfortable look that always popped up when they talked about Cordelia. Jesse really hated her. Or something like that. “She’s way out of your league.”
“Well, there’s always Cari and Colleen,” Willow said, giving them both a dirty look. “Have fun with your slayer-obsession. Oz and I are going to dance.”
“It’s not like we like them because they’re slayers,” Xander said sulkily. “Our options are just really limited. It’s either Faith or runs-with-scissors Sheila Martini.”
Jesse gave him an odd look. “Faith?”
Thankfully, they were interrupted by a guy who hustled past them, nearly knocking Jesse over in the process. “Watch it!” Jesse called after him. The guy turned to sneer at them, his face changing suddenly as he flashed yellow eyes and a mangled brow in their direction in warning.
Xander stared. “Uh, Jesse?”
“Yeah?” Jesse sounded just as shaken.
“Was that a vampire?”
“Think so.”
Ahead of them, the vampire was talking to an older girl dressed in a skimpy red dress, his hands on her waist as they swayed to the music. He motioned toward the back door and she nodded, moving with it in that direction.
“He’s going to kill her,” Xander noted, a cold chill running through him. “We’ve got to stop him.”
He started toward the exit, but Jesse grabbed his arm warningly. “Xan, all we’re going to do is become vamp food out there! We’re not slayers!”
“Screw slayers.” Xander’s jaw tightened. “We’re that girl’s only chance right now, and I’m not just going to let her die because we’re not good enough. Are you coming or not?”
He was barely aware of Jesse’s protests, his eyes on the door and what awaited them behind it. It didn’t matter here if he’d failed his finals, if his father and teachers and Faith all thought that he was useless. Giles said that he could fight in a team of watchers, that he was brave and capable enough to make a difference. And this was going to be his first real test.
There was a pile of stakes lying right next to the exit when he opened the door, odd in other towns but the norm in this one. In fact, the one he picked up was a garish red and had I survived the Hellmouth™ inscribed on it in an eerie script. He tested it against his finger to ensure that it was made of wood. You never knew with these things.
A muffled cry jerked him from his perusal of the stake, and he jolted, spun, and hurtled toward the vampire at top speed, surprising it enough that it dropped the girl and turned to stare at Xander in surprise. “Run!” Xander yelled, angling the stake and attempting to thrust it forward.
The vampire scowled, knocking it aside. “I hate the boys. They’ve got a miserable taste.” Even so, it grabbed Xander by the neck of his t-shirt, shoving him against the wall roughly.
“Hey!” Jesse howled, running at them. “Get off of him!” The vampire snorted, lashing at Jesse with a foot. Jesse fell and scrambled back up, jumping onto the creature’s back and stabbing over his shoulder at the heart with desperate thrusts. The vampire grunted with annoyance and shook him off.
Xander kicked frantically at the vampire’s gut, shuddering as its teeth drew near his neck. Just a little closer, and…
And then the vampire was torn away from him and he fell to the ground in a heap, staring upwards in shocked relief. Had Jesse…?
But no, it was a tall girl with pale blond hair and cold blue eyes. “Little boys?” she said incredulously. “What, is there a shortage of pretty co-eds in town tonight?”
“Slayer,” the vampire choked out, its eyes glittering.
She kicked at him in a classic martial arts pose, staking him midway and propelling herself through the scattering dust off the wall and back to a stiff stance opposite them. “New to Sunnydale?” She raised an eyebrow. “Don’t hang out in the alleys. All kinds of nasty things here.”
“You’re the slayer?” Xander asked doubtfully, studying her with a frown. Come to think of it, she did look vaguely familiar, the way that some of the older watchers who’d graduated and came back to the Academy to visit did.
She stared at him. “Academy?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m Narra.” She turned to go. “Don’t play hero, watchers. Not here, not ever.”
She was gone before Xander could respond, and he stood unsteadily, exhilaration combining with raw fear to create a rush that made him dizzy with adrenaline. “We’ve got to do that again.”
--
“Hi, Giles!” Buffy said brightly, taking a seat next to him on the boardwalk bench.
“How are you?” Faith said with equal enthusiasm, plopping down on the other side. “Anya been treating you well?”
“She mention anything interesting?”
“About Buffy? And what Anya thinks is best for her training?”
Buffy mock-shuddered. “I’d hate to think that she’d be upset with you if you didn’t heed her advice. She’s sensitive about these things.”
“Very sensitive,” Faith emphasized, shaking her head in false concern. “Don’t you agree, Buffy?”
“Absolutely, Faith.”
Giles rubbed his temples. “Buffy, you can’t fight Spike again. Not at this level of your training.”
“But he can be my training!” Buffy protested. “How better to learn to beat master vampires than to train with master vampires?”
Giles sighed. “You had to be hospitalized last time.”
“And look at me now. I’m right as rain, as you British people say. Hey! You know who else is British?”
Faith rubbed her head thoughtfully. “Could it be that vampire you fought before the summer? I remember that fight. Gunn said that you were unbelievable, fighting better than you have in ages. What was the vampire’s name? Something with an S…S…Sp…”
“Alright!” Giles shook his head. “I’ll consider it.”
“Thank you, Giles!” Buffy gave him a hug. It was a calculated gesture, since all the slayers knew that hugs left Giles flustering and vaguely pleased, and Faith watched with a smirk. She’d never hug Giles, of course. It wasn’t her style. But Buffy used it to her advantage whenever it suited her, and sometimes just because. “You’re the greatest!”
They descended the boardwalk back toward the surf together. “Thanks for backing me up.”
Faith shrugged. “That’s what I do, you know that.”
“Yeah.” She gave Faith a smile. “I’m going to fight him again,” she said slowly, her smile widening. “Next time, we’ll ask Anya to come-“ Faith shaded her eyes to peer back at Giles. Anya was already sitting with him there, her head resting on his shoulder in a way that would have been sweet if Giles hadn’t been so damn old. “-And Giles will have to agree.”
“I’m sure.”
Buffy stopped to look at her. “Listen, I know you don’t want to talk about it…but would you want to fight Kakistos?”
“Who? Oh, yeah. Him.” Faith hadn’t given him much thought, not after she’d met Angelus. She had more important things to consider. Like the barrier spell, and how she was going to take it down.
She’d found out quickly enough that the barrier had been instituted a few years before, the work of, of all people, Mr. Wyndham-Pryce. Lucky for her, that meant that all the research material was readily available. Unfortunately, she was no researcher, and at this point, she was seriously considering somehow conning Willow into helping her take it down. Much as she hated to admit it, it was time to accept that she couldn’t do it alone.
“Nah, I don’t care about him,” she said flippantly. She had a far more important vampire to worry about now, anyway.
Look at us, she mused, Two slayers with two separate goals concerning two separate vampires. It did sound a bit morbid. But at least her goal wasn’t dangerous like Buffy’s…
No, she just wanted to get closer to Angelus. No fighting or injuries necessary.
***************
(To be notified when I update this fic, hit "Track Comments" below and select "rose" from the keywords, then pick how you want to be contacted.)
Next