Spikeid IV
!!! I know, I know, it took long enough, didn't it? Still, I have a new plan of attack called doing chapters in groups, to make the reading experience a little more pleasant. V will be posted this evening as well and VI is COMING SOON in actual real terms (like maybe the weekend?), rather than Spikeid terms of soon meaning maybe a year...
THANK YOU a thousand times to my awesometown betas of these books, brutti_ma_buoni, ladyofthelog and
fulselden. Your critiques were awesome! Thanks also to ariss_tenoh for discussing with me the scansion of some words in this book I don't often hear.
Warnings: we are still very much dealing with the fallout from death and denial of bodily agency. A less important pseudo-warning is for the prevalence of OCs and minor characters in this book - we return to our favourites in Book V, so this evening, but I think this is an important book nonetheless and they haven't been completely forgotten, so I hope you still enjoy it!
As usual, it's around ~4000 words (~550 lines) and rated PG-13, with a touch of the swearing.
The Slayers meet another group of people who are fighting in LA.
[III]
IV
The Slayers run on hearing Buffy's cry,
Retreat without co-ordination, turn
About and almost trip on all the feet
Around them. They can hear the reason why
She yelled in warning, growls below high yelps
And snarls and siren-howling of the wind.
Their training’s shared, their instincts too, and so
They quickly pull their senses to alert
And find an alleyway: their bottleneck.
They turn as one, the thuds and splashes of
Their running veering from the street so they
Can make a stand. A chain-link fence is tall
Behind their backs, and promises at least
A warning if another threat should come.
It only takes a second for the group
To shrug their sodden rucksacks off their backs
And to the slickened tarmac, arm themselves.
The rain is harder now and as they join
Formation words cannot be heard except
Through shouts. “A shield!” Samina yells above
The wind, “Can you lot make a shield for us?”
She's looking at the witches, knows Gurpreet
Can do it with some help, but not if there's
A problem with the forces in LA,
Or if that Sadie girl's not up to it
(It's understandable). They link their hands -
But as the air begins its crackling
Samina sees that Sadie’s had too much.
She cannot hack this so she pulls away,
Backs up against the wall. “Not yet.” She shakes
Her head. There isn’t time to talk so Xiao
Is yelling, “Come on, guys;” they're grouping round
So Sadie can recover at the back.
And, yeah, that's pretty sensible 'cause then
The demons run right by them, spin and turn
To huff and scrape their feet between the walls.
Samina eyes one down, which makes it growl,
A fox-like scowl across its steel-furred face,
Above its eyes. Raquel is at her back -
She’s got a cold, so coughs from chill. It’s then
The fight gets started, heartbeats like a bass.
Samina loves the fighting part of this,
The slaying. Danger she can live without,
But fighting, yeah, she loves it, spinning round
On bouncy Nike trainers, cutting low,
A little bit of streetstyle dancing, so
The demon slips and rolls and splashes flat
Against a puddle; crouching down so you
Can punch your knife through hide and make it game,
Set, match Samina. Check Raquel's OK,
Take out the one that's snapping at her side
Then get back in, swear nice and violently
When unseen claws leap from a dumpster, slash
And cut your Kappa jacket, take revenge
And gut this one a little deeper, though,
No shit, you've got its blood all up your sleeve
And why the fuck did you wear white for this?
The pack is huge, but they are in control,
The London crew and Lise's Germans, plus
That Rita girl is pulling ninja moves,
Which no one taught them back in Inverness.
Gurpreet's got magic fire glowing bright,
A moment flare: she immolates a knot
Of demons, light so bright it almost blinds
Samina: “Watch it!” she shouts out, despite
The fact she knows that no one's listening.
The shortest breather, quick shake of her head,
And then she lifts her knife again and turns
On gravel -
- Skids in shock and nearly falls
As there’s a fox-thing leaping at her face,
As out of nowhere there's a crossbow bolt
That strikes the neck of her opponent, fells
The thing stone dead before her, makes its yelp
A whimper. Running footsteps splash and thud
Like rubber-soled, like shop-bought shoes in rain;
They’re coming closer, either threat or friend.
Her heart is pounding but she stills her hand -
A gang emerges from the darkness, dressed
In blacks and greys, but muted colours too:
Samina watches as they join the fight,
A washed-out rainbow that still beats the cloud.
She laughs and someone hears, a black guy in
A purple hoodie, few stray dreadlocks long
Around his shoulders, crossbow on his arm;
He seems surprised to see she’s young. “Hey, girl,”
He asks, “Are you OK?” He looks around.
“The hell are all you doing here?” It’s then
A wounded demon's kicked by Rita right
In front of them and flies to bricks not far
Away. “We're Slayers,” Mina says and sighs.
“We're here to help.” Or so they like to think.
The guy turns to the carnage happening
Behind his back; he nods and then turns to.
An eyebrow raised he snorts and says “OK...”
Samina smiles awkwardly at him
And tries to look more competent: she buffs
Her trainers on her joggers. Lost cause there -
Those bastard demons… But, it’s not all bad,
Despite her ruined gear. The guy and her,
They watch as now the fight is drawing still,
The pack of demons long outnumbered now.
They’re corpses more than bodies, one on two,
On three against the humans, snarling scared.
They don’t make pretty sounds, but she prefers
To hear them whine than hear a friend cry out,
Scream long the way that Laura screamed the time
That five of them went on the ferry boat
To harrow Skara Brae and only four
Came back.
Samina looks away, eyes shut,
And waits until the screaming’s gone and there
Is silence. “So, like, who are you lot, then?”
That's Xiao who's asking; Mina looks back up.
The guy she spoke with has rejoined his group,
And in the muffled starlight (helped along
By twinkle-dust Elise's casting round
Their heads) Samina sees his gang is what
She might have guessed - they’re mostly black - and what
She might have hoped - they’re all as fit as him.
At least the men are anyway; they’ve got
Some women too. One looks at Xiao and snarks,
“Survivors, marking time.” Samina thinks
She’s old-ish, maybe twenty? Twenty-five?
More Buffy's age than theirs, for definite.
“Your buddy told Jamal y'all are here
To help; we saw from 'cross the street you got
Some preternatural thing going on. You want
To come with us? We got a base with food
And decent beds; a friend of ours, she runs
A homeless shelter.” Then there's silence, well,
There's howling wind and crashing rain, until
Sabrina (or that skinny German blonde,
As she was known before the other day)
Pipes up with something and they go again,
Elise dropping into German so
Her friends can hear what’s happening, and then
Alana taking that to Spanish so
That Rita nods ungrateful, short and terse,
While Kadriye is asking questions at
Elise, glancing at her watch. (Oh yeah,
Right, Maghrib’s due - and Isha.) All the while,
Then, Sadie stutters to Krystina in
Her shaky Russian; both the pair of them
Use gestures more than words, exchanging das,
Niets and not much more. It takes a while.
“Sabrina's right,” Elise says at last,
“We need recover Buffy now, before
We go. And I should not maintain this light.”
They try to find her. Lise sits in calm,
As much as possible as others guard
Her meditating form. It’s hard to work
Without supplies, to concentrate enough
Without a candle flickering, or else
A crystal’s flaw that she can focus on,
But still she tries to clear her mind until
Eventually she feels herself at peace
Against the tarmac, Gaia’s world below.
Unlike the ghastly Disney glitter sparks
She finds herself creating (cringing), this
Is what she understands. Connected now
She tries to find where Buffy is - but then…
It’s hard, it’s murky, too much disconnect
Surrounds them in this place. She can’t be sure
What’s going on - she tries, but, really, no.
“I cannot find her,” opening her eyes
Elise tells the others, biting back
Her guilt against their disappointed sighs.
She knows without more power to her call
There is no way for her to force a search
That actually will yield them some results.
“We’d best keep going then,” Raquel says, grim.
They all agree, though it’s Alana who
Is kind enough to hug Sabrina tight,
Remind both her and little Kadriye
That Buffy has survived for years alone,
Without them watching out for her.
They walk
Down unfamiliar streets. Elise thinks
About the way the earth felt lost, below,
Can’t concentrate on anything but how
That felt, her panic rising with unease.
The earth should not be as disturbed as this -
And nor should she. Elise shuts her eyes,
Just for a moment, thinks of calm and takes
A breath to centre even as they walk.
The breath does not flow smoothly; here the air
Is out of balance also, thin, which brings
The water flooding forwards to the sun,
The earth beneath her churning in its bleak
Disquiet. Yes, but she expected this
Must think a little clearer, take in breaths
A little deeper so she’ll understand.
She breathes more air and knows that there will be
No earthquake, but, still, air should not be thinned
Like this. That means the trouble's coming from
Above; that limits options. There's a hint -
She takes another breath, and then she's sure -
There's something there that tickles at her lungs
And tastes of sweetened minerals, sherbet, white.
It's not of their dimension, but instead
Of somewhere higher up, that fills her with
A sense of shrieking synchronicity;
She'll get a headache if she breathes like this
For long, and English voices far in front
Of her are grating; every step of theirs
Is much too loud, too out of time as they
Track through the rain, too individual.
Elise blinks her eyes back open, starts
And says, “We must be nearly there,” to try
And get back in the conversation, which
Cues in Alana to the fact that she's
Unnerved and brings a frown above her eyes,
Her eyebrows closed across her open face.
It's nice that she is seventeen as well;
The other two, though friends, so often sound
Like children to her. “Es gibt kein Problem,”
She mutters quickly as she shakes her head,
Then tries to switch her mind to English, though
She hates how thick and sloppy every word
Feels round her tongue. A few quick steps skipped past
The other Slayers and she's at the front;
She asks the woman who addressed them all
Before, “Excuse me, but how farther is
It now?” And she replies that it's rye deer.
Ride ear? Right ear? Upon their right? Right here -
Of course it's obvious when they have stopped.
The building, though, is unremarkable,
The windows boarded up and door locked tight;
It looks like every other building on
The street. But that has got to be the point.
A man who has the keys comes forth and stoops,
Contrives clavigerous alchemy, then rocks
Back on his heels, quick quirks his head to say
That they should enter. This is when they're most
At risk, this moment that the base is on
Display and so a hush falls on them, thick.
They file in through the doorway, into dark.
At last the door is shut behind them, then
Another door is opened, bringing light:
It's orange-yellow, dim, but still it's light
And blinding being so. They anteroom,
With corrugated iron walls, gives way
To open space, where groups are talking, where
Right in the centre one man sits and stares
Hard at the map in front of him, ill lit
By his electric lamp. He glances up
Just once, then stands up shocked. His steps are quick
And purposeful across the floor. “Hey, Jade,”
He says, “You wanna tell me who you brought
With you?” The man, Jamal, holds up a hand,
“Hey, yo, I'm gonna check on Leo, 'K?”
And nods at both the other two before
He rushes off; then Jade replies, “It's cool,
Rondell: some 'Slayer' army.” Shrugging with
Her crossbow she continues, “Guess the word
Got out?” Rondell begins to smile as though
He won't believe that's possible; the world
Has left them there to die, he's sure of it.
But still he turns and calls around the stairs
Into the back, “Hey, Anne, we got some room?
We got...” “Eleven,” Xiao supplies. “We got
Eleven girly 'Slayers' here as help.”
There comes a minor crash, perhaps a plate,
And then this Anne appears, eyes bright in her
Pale face. She speaks with shaky hope and drinks
Their armed and bloody forms in with her eyes,
“Did you say Slayers? Are you Slayers? Is,
Um, Buffy with you?” Xiao replies again,
A short lift of her chin as she looks round;
The whole room stares at them. “We don't know where
She is.” Anne takes a breath then takes control.
“We've got two dorms upstairs,” she says. “They're yours.”
They troop upstairs, but Sadie doesn't leave
The room like all the others after her.
She waits then shuts the door behind her back
To sink curled up against it, wretchedness
Unleashed by their relief in stopping here.
She shuts her eyes as well, attempts to block
The sight of dreary bunks in front of her,
The groundswell-murmuring of voices that
Is pounding on the wood behind her head.
She doesn't want to hear as all the rest
Explain their situation, introduce
Themselves and point her out as she who brought
Them here and probably killed Buffy too.
She doesn't know why death keeps bleeding from
Her fingertips, infecting everyone
Around her. She should be locked up or kept
Away or sterilised somehow so she can't hurt
Another person. Now, of course, it seems
So obvious, the reason why no god
Has wanted her: she's trouble, far too much...
Her tears are back again and clutching bright
Around her sinuses, but even so
They only make her feel pathetic, trite
Because, when she is her, how dare she cry?
She wipes them angrily away and climbs
Back to her feet, heaves self and rucksack up
And to bunk that's farthest from the door,
Quite distant in the corner, curling tight
Around herself beneath the blanket, eyes
Now set wide open to the dim lamp light.
Her magic, hot and blue electric charge,
Is loosing current through her, something dark
Inside her, something running through her veins
Like blood, but quicker, something that she can't
Switch off, not now, not anymore. If she
Could ever switch it off then that's a skill
She's irrevocably forgotten, which
Is terrifying since she's still alone.
She can't imagine even Lise or
Gurpreet would understand this feeling, since
They've found the source of where they get their spells:
Elise's happy with the earth and all
That hippy stuff; Gurpreet, her dad is Sikh,
But, still, her mum is Hindu, so she seems
To understand what’s going on with her.
She thinks how Mr. Giles always (well,
Before she killed him), in his training talks
He always said that you could call upon
Whomever for a spell and usually
There wouldn't be a problem, but it paid
To be consistent (so he also said),
Because it wasn't strange for gods sometimes
To favour those who weren't consorting with
Their bitter enemies. She'd laughed because
She'd been so nervous; she remembers that.
But now she only knows that she's alone,
A killer and a fraidy-cat too scared
To help with fighting evil anymore.
For, after all, she is too scared (or scarred,
Perhaps?) to do a simple spell.
She lies
Tight curled up in a ball and feels the time
That passes, minutes ticking by. Outside
The voices are still murmuring; they saw
She can remember, how she stood, beheld
That power in that room. She saw the world
As nothing but that matrix, glowing threads
Of life, the future and the past clear cut
And dried and certain. When she made her choice
With Mr. Giles, fixed imperfections with
A darning needle fashioned from his life,
Eradicating every snag had seemed
So crucially important... Why? She asks
Of every scrap of magic in her - why?
She's not opposed to divination, since
It sometimes seems like prophecy is what
She's good at, even though she doesn't have
The sight. The future feels complete sometimes,
Or still elusive, but an image in
The distance, brightly shining slightly out
Of view - but even so she's never seen
Her task as shaping it so neat that life
Will fit a plan that someone else has made.
She wishes Buffy wasn't lost outside;
She said she understood and didn't blame
Her for Osiris' influence, was nice to her,
Was always nice since Xander brought her up
To Inverness from school. And so, you know,
She can’t be dead. She wishes she could tell
Somehow, repay her crime with usefulness.
But then, she thinks, her tarot cards, of course;
They work a different way, reveal the truth
Without the need for magic from her hands.
She opens up the toggles of her bag
And reaches past her clothes, remembers when
Her mother gave the cards to her: they were
Her most unwanted Christmas present and
A challenge (she was sure) to her desire
To study maths and sciences, a cri
De coeur made by a failed actress. (Oh,
She misses Mum and how her hugs would be
All Chanel No. 5 and pearls. But how
Can she go back and tell her what she's done?
Tell Dad about Osiris? Yet she wants
To go.) She'd never thought that she'd be good
With them, the cards, and yet from that first time
She sat there with her mum, spread out her choice
The way she thought looked sensible, ignored
The book and made up all the meanings, she
Has read them always with uncanny truth.
She takes the box and shakes it till the cards
Come out, then starts to shuffle them between
Her trembling hands, so worried that she can't…
She almost cannot focus - then, at last,
She's happy, cuts the deck and stacks it up.
There hasn't been a need to change the spread
That she worked out that time; she's always dealt
The cards the same. The first three cards, first row,
Are situational; they're simply past,
Then present, future. They will show if she's
Alive. Though Sadie hasn't ever read
For someone dead she knows she'll know the way
It feels (it's odd the way that having cards
Back in her hands can make her feel that warmth
Of glimmering confidence, no matter how
Short-lived). The Nine of Wands, reversed, her past,
Which isn't so important, still is not
What Sadie was expecting. There's a man,
A staff held in his hands, eight other staffs
Behind him; he should be prepared to fight,
Like Buffy must have been in Sunnydale,
But upside down the worry on his face
Is too apparent, all the staffs (that could
Be stakes) aren't helping him but might as well
Be falling round his ears. There's no one there
To hold them, not a friend or comrade with
A helping hand. He must feel so alone,
His hopes of others standing with him dashed.
And so she must have felt.
And then how she
Is now - The Chariot, reversed again,
A blond man sitting tall behind his team
Of sphinxes, the decision to leave home,
So obviously precarious now proved
Disrupted, broken; Sadie feels a catch
Inside her throat, can feel close-grinding gears
And axles of emotions dealing with
The sudden break of movement, feels the crash.
She's... Yeah, she's still alive, but not so well.
The future, though, is better, Six of Wands:
The laurelled victor riding on his horse,
Companions bearing staffs beside him; is
That Buffy though? The scene is giving her
The feeling that it's not, or maybe that
The victor is just victory; the wreath
That crowns the staff is more important than
The one that's worn. That there's a group, the bond,
That's also something, gladdening in the sun.
The smallest smile is lit on Sadie's lips,
For that is not a future to be feared,
Despite the darkness that has come before.
It makes her want to finish off the spread;
She's got her information, but the hope
That she is feeling isn't something she
Can happily let go; she wants the cards
To make her feel like this for all the time
They can. And so she deals another row,
The influences of events, the states
Of mind and heart and temperaments which brought
Them to fruition. First's the past, the Queen
Of Swords; and, oh, she sees her sitting stern,
Decisive, in control of what she feels,
No matter if it's sorrow. Others could
Have taken weapons, but she didn't think
She had to offer; then she didn't want
To show her discontent. Now Sadie's glad
That's over; what's the present? Knight of Swords,
So similar, but now they're in the midst
Of the decision-making, rushing wind
Around their ears, the sword held high, a man
So sudden coming. Yes, of course, you can't
Be driving chariots in weather harsh
As this, they're too unstable, doomed to crash
And make you carry on by foot, take care
And travel slowly to the change that meets
You in the future, falling underneath
The Hanged Man. There’ll be a change, she sees,
In them, the man strung up and upside down
To view the world a little differently -
And they will do it, forge their victory
From whittled gallows and some knotted rope.
They’ll make this different future theirs and she
Will leave the past strung up behind her as
She marches on.
The final row, the four
Last cards, should tell her, Sadie, everything
More generally, but she’s not sure they’ll speak
Of Buffy, rather than of her, since they
Concern the subject as a questioner,
Which should be fine as a description, but -
It doesn’t quite apply to what she’s done.
Still Sadie deals and sees the Ace of Cups,
Reversed, as the description of her state,
This questioner. It breaks her heart a touch,
As well it should, what with the cups the suit
Of flowing joy, emotion, hope - or so
The ace will bring out if it's nurtured, not
Upset and spilled like this cup is. The hand
That holds it on this card is pushing it
Away from all its native water, till
It loses every drop of feeling. Well
It could apply to her, so Sadie thinks,
If not to Buffy - since she doesn't know
Her well enough to judge. The second card
For this row is the outside influence
Upon the general way that things turn out,
And Sadie stills the second that she sees
The King of Wands. She stares at it so hard
The lines fall out of focus, every card
That lies across the yellow blanket is
A blur to her. Of course it would be him,
The card that is a father, noble to
The last but with the dark capacity
For strictness that's unyielding. It's him,
It has to be, it's Mr. Giles, who watched
For Buffy all those years, whose harried face
She sees in scowling disappointment, love
And every now and then betrayal, but
A teacher all the same. But then a flash:
That King of Wands is shown as someone else,
A figure sitting strict in judgement, with
His fists around the wooden handles of
His crook and flail...
Yes, Sadie's crying now,
Saltwater coming up to cloud her sight
That little more. She wishes now that she
Could not see visions in the cards this well.
Her shaking hand moves blindly forward, turns
Him over so there's only memory,
Her nemesis, still blazing from the spread,
But still it takes a while to muster up
The nerve to clear her eyes and let her sight
Fall on the Four of Swords - the way she feels
(Which she it's still not clear) within herself.
A tomb, a knight at rest inside a church,
Three swords still hung up ready on the wall,
Another carved into the shadowed stone
Of the sarcophagus. But he's not dead:
The knight is resting after battle, which
Could only be the case in tarot land,
But still she feels it, taking refuge from
The struggle in the peace of church before
He goes back to the front, takes up a sword
That's hanging ready for him. Is this her?
Or is this Buffy? She cannot believe
That what she's done permits such rest or that
She's feeling it in coming to LA.
Is Buffy though? Perhaps she is? The rest,
So Sadie understands, is not a rest
That's lazy; it's a ritual, bizarre
But somehow wholesome, like the knight entombed.
The final outcome also shows that sense
Of things: the Six of Swords, much calmer than
The future card of Wands, despite the suits
Suggesting quite the opposite. The swords
Aren't strife here, but simplicity, a clear
And piercing note of sweetness rising once
The battle's over, chorus of the dawn
That's singing on the journey home, across
The water like the picture shows, when they'll
Reflect on everything that happens here.
But even as she touches fingertips
Against that card she can't imagine how
It feels, and screwing shut her eyes against
The tears that come she doesn’t want to try,
But curls instead back down into the bed
And tries to make it dark enough to hide.
[V]
[There are
comments on Dreamwidth!]
THANK YOU a thousand times to my awesometown betas of these books, brutti_ma_buoni, ladyofthelog and
fulselden. Your critiques were awesome! Thanks also to ariss_tenoh for discussing with me the scansion of some words in this book I don't often hear.
Warnings: we are still very much dealing with the fallout from death and denial of bodily agency. A less important pseudo-warning is for the prevalence of OCs and minor characters in this book - we return to our favourites in Book V, so this evening, but I think this is an important book nonetheless and they haven't been completely forgotten, so I hope you still enjoy it!
As usual, it's around ~4000 words (~550 lines) and rated PG-13, with a touch of the swearing.
The Slayers meet another group of people who are fighting in LA.
[III]
IV
The Slayers run on hearing Buffy's cry,
Retreat without co-ordination, turn
About and almost trip on all the feet
Around them. They can hear the reason why
She yelled in warning, growls below high yelps
And snarls and siren-howling of the wind.
Their training’s shared, their instincts too, and so
They quickly pull their senses to alert
And find an alleyway: their bottleneck.
They turn as one, the thuds and splashes of
Their running veering from the street so they
Can make a stand. A chain-link fence is tall
Behind their backs, and promises at least
A warning if another threat should come.
It only takes a second for the group
To shrug their sodden rucksacks off their backs
And to the slickened tarmac, arm themselves.
The rain is harder now and as they join
Formation words cannot be heard except
Through shouts. “A shield!” Samina yells above
The wind, “Can you lot make a shield for us?”
She's looking at the witches, knows Gurpreet
Can do it with some help, but not if there's
A problem with the forces in LA,
Or if that Sadie girl's not up to it
(It's understandable). They link their hands -
But as the air begins its crackling
Samina sees that Sadie’s had too much.
She cannot hack this so she pulls away,
Backs up against the wall. “Not yet.” She shakes
Her head. There isn’t time to talk so Xiao
Is yelling, “Come on, guys;” they're grouping round
So Sadie can recover at the back.
And, yeah, that's pretty sensible 'cause then
The demons run right by them, spin and turn
To huff and scrape their feet between the walls.
Samina eyes one down, which makes it growl,
A fox-like scowl across its steel-furred face,
Above its eyes. Raquel is at her back -
She’s got a cold, so coughs from chill. It’s then
The fight gets started, heartbeats like a bass.
Samina loves the fighting part of this,
The slaying. Danger she can live without,
But fighting, yeah, she loves it, spinning round
On bouncy Nike trainers, cutting low,
A little bit of streetstyle dancing, so
The demon slips and rolls and splashes flat
Against a puddle; crouching down so you
Can punch your knife through hide and make it game,
Set, match Samina. Check Raquel's OK,
Take out the one that's snapping at her side
Then get back in, swear nice and violently
When unseen claws leap from a dumpster, slash
And cut your Kappa jacket, take revenge
And gut this one a little deeper, though,
No shit, you've got its blood all up your sleeve
And why the fuck did you wear white for this?
The pack is huge, but they are in control,
The London crew and Lise's Germans, plus
That Rita girl is pulling ninja moves,
Which no one taught them back in Inverness.
Gurpreet's got magic fire glowing bright,
A moment flare: she immolates a knot
Of demons, light so bright it almost blinds
Samina: “Watch it!” she shouts out, despite
The fact she knows that no one's listening.
The shortest breather, quick shake of her head,
And then she lifts her knife again and turns
On gravel -
- Skids in shock and nearly falls
As there’s a fox-thing leaping at her face,
As out of nowhere there's a crossbow bolt
That strikes the neck of her opponent, fells
The thing stone dead before her, makes its yelp
A whimper. Running footsteps splash and thud
Like rubber-soled, like shop-bought shoes in rain;
They’re coming closer, either threat or friend.
Her heart is pounding but she stills her hand -
A gang emerges from the darkness, dressed
In blacks and greys, but muted colours too:
Samina watches as they join the fight,
A washed-out rainbow that still beats the cloud.
She laughs and someone hears, a black guy in
A purple hoodie, few stray dreadlocks long
Around his shoulders, crossbow on his arm;
He seems surprised to see she’s young. “Hey, girl,”
He asks, “Are you OK?” He looks around.
“The hell are all you doing here?” It’s then
A wounded demon's kicked by Rita right
In front of them and flies to bricks not far
Away. “We're Slayers,” Mina says and sighs.
“We're here to help.” Or so they like to think.
The guy turns to the carnage happening
Behind his back; he nods and then turns to.
An eyebrow raised he snorts and says “OK...”
Samina smiles awkwardly at him
And tries to look more competent: she buffs
Her trainers on her joggers. Lost cause there -
Those bastard demons… But, it’s not all bad,
Despite her ruined gear. The guy and her,
They watch as now the fight is drawing still,
The pack of demons long outnumbered now.
They’re corpses more than bodies, one on two,
On three against the humans, snarling scared.
They don’t make pretty sounds, but she prefers
To hear them whine than hear a friend cry out,
Scream long the way that Laura screamed the time
That five of them went on the ferry boat
To harrow Skara Brae and only four
Came back.
Samina looks away, eyes shut,
And waits until the screaming’s gone and there
Is silence. “So, like, who are you lot, then?”
That's Xiao who's asking; Mina looks back up.
The guy she spoke with has rejoined his group,
And in the muffled starlight (helped along
By twinkle-dust Elise's casting round
Their heads) Samina sees his gang is what
She might have guessed - they’re mostly black - and what
She might have hoped - they’re all as fit as him.
At least the men are anyway; they’ve got
Some women too. One looks at Xiao and snarks,
“Survivors, marking time.” Samina thinks
She’s old-ish, maybe twenty? Twenty-five?
More Buffy's age than theirs, for definite.
“Your buddy told Jamal y'all are here
To help; we saw from 'cross the street you got
Some preternatural thing going on. You want
To come with us? We got a base with food
And decent beds; a friend of ours, she runs
A homeless shelter.” Then there's silence, well,
There's howling wind and crashing rain, until
Sabrina (or that skinny German blonde,
As she was known before the other day)
Pipes up with something and they go again,
Elise dropping into German so
Her friends can hear what’s happening, and then
Alana taking that to Spanish so
That Rita nods ungrateful, short and terse,
While Kadriye is asking questions at
Elise, glancing at her watch. (Oh yeah,
Right, Maghrib’s due - and Isha.) All the while,
Then, Sadie stutters to Krystina in
Her shaky Russian; both the pair of them
Use gestures more than words, exchanging das,
Niets and not much more. It takes a while.
“Sabrina's right,” Elise says at last,
“We need recover Buffy now, before
We go. And I should not maintain this light.”
They try to find her. Lise sits in calm,
As much as possible as others guard
Her meditating form. It’s hard to work
Without supplies, to concentrate enough
Without a candle flickering, or else
A crystal’s flaw that she can focus on,
But still she tries to clear her mind until
Eventually she feels herself at peace
Against the tarmac, Gaia’s world below.
Unlike the ghastly Disney glitter sparks
She finds herself creating (cringing), this
Is what she understands. Connected now
She tries to find where Buffy is - but then…
It’s hard, it’s murky, too much disconnect
Surrounds them in this place. She can’t be sure
What’s going on - she tries, but, really, no.
“I cannot find her,” opening her eyes
Elise tells the others, biting back
Her guilt against their disappointed sighs.
She knows without more power to her call
There is no way for her to force a search
That actually will yield them some results.
“We’d best keep going then,” Raquel says, grim.
They all agree, though it’s Alana who
Is kind enough to hug Sabrina tight,
Remind both her and little Kadriye
That Buffy has survived for years alone,
Without them watching out for her.
They walk
Down unfamiliar streets. Elise thinks
About the way the earth felt lost, below,
Can’t concentrate on anything but how
That felt, her panic rising with unease.
The earth should not be as disturbed as this -
And nor should she. Elise shuts her eyes,
Just for a moment, thinks of calm and takes
A breath to centre even as they walk.
The breath does not flow smoothly; here the air
Is out of balance also, thin, which brings
The water flooding forwards to the sun,
The earth beneath her churning in its bleak
Disquiet. Yes, but she expected this
Must think a little clearer, take in breaths
A little deeper so she’ll understand.
She breathes more air and knows that there will be
No earthquake, but, still, air should not be thinned
Like this. That means the trouble's coming from
Above; that limits options. There's a hint -
She takes another breath, and then she's sure -
There's something there that tickles at her lungs
And tastes of sweetened minerals, sherbet, white.
It's not of their dimension, but instead
Of somewhere higher up, that fills her with
A sense of shrieking synchronicity;
She'll get a headache if she breathes like this
For long, and English voices far in front
Of her are grating; every step of theirs
Is much too loud, too out of time as they
Track through the rain, too individual.
Elise blinks her eyes back open, starts
And says, “We must be nearly there,” to try
And get back in the conversation, which
Cues in Alana to the fact that she's
Unnerved and brings a frown above her eyes,
Her eyebrows closed across her open face.
It's nice that she is seventeen as well;
The other two, though friends, so often sound
Like children to her. “Es gibt kein Problem,”
She mutters quickly as she shakes her head,
Then tries to switch her mind to English, though
She hates how thick and sloppy every word
Feels round her tongue. A few quick steps skipped past
The other Slayers and she's at the front;
She asks the woman who addressed them all
Before, “Excuse me, but how farther is
It now?” And she replies that it's rye deer.
Ride ear? Right ear? Upon their right? Right here -
Of course it's obvious when they have stopped.
The building, though, is unremarkable,
The windows boarded up and door locked tight;
It looks like every other building on
The street. But that has got to be the point.
A man who has the keys comes forth and stoops,
Contrives clavigerous alchemy, then rocks
Back on his heels, quick quirks his head to say
That they should enter. This is when they're most
At risk, this moment that the base is on
Display and so a hush falls on them, thick.
They file in through the doorway, into dark.
At last the door is shut behind them, then
Another door is opened, bringing light:
It's orange-yellow, dim, but still it's light
And blinding being so. They anteroom,
With corrugated iron walls, gives way
To open space, where groups are talking, where
Right in the centre one man sits and stares
Hard at the map in front of him, ill lit
By his electric lamp. He glances up
Just once, then stands up shocked. His steps are quick
And purposeful across the floor. “Hey, Jade,”
He says, “You wanna tell me who you brought
With you?” The man, Jamal, holds up a hand,
“Hey, yo, I'm gonna check on Leo, 'K?”
And nods at both the other two before
He rushes off; then Jade replies, “It's cool,
Rondell: some 'Slayer' army.” Shrugging with
Her crossbow she continues, “Guess the word
Got out?” Rondell begins to smile as though
He won't believe that's possible; the world
Has left them there to die, he's sure of it.
But still he turns and calls around the stairs
Into the back, “Hey, Anne, we got some room?
We got...” “Eleven,” Xiao supplies. “We got
Eleven girly 'Slayers' here as help.”
There comes a minor crash, perhaps a plate,
And then this Anne appears, eyes bright in her
Pale face. She speaks with shaky hope and drinks
Their armed and bloody forms in with her eyes,
“Did you say Slayers? Are you Slayers? Is,
Um, Buffy with you?” Xiao replies again,
A short lift of her chin as she looks round;
The whole room stares at them. “We don't know where
She is.” Anne takes a breath then takes control.
“We've got two dorms upstairs,” she says. “They're yours.”
They troop upstairs, but Sadie doesn't leave
The room like all the others after her.
She waits then shuts the door behind her back
To sink curled up against it, wretchedness
Unleashed by their relief in stopping here.
She shuts her eyes as well, attempts to block
The sight of dreary bunks in front of her,
The groundswell-murmuring of voices that
Is pounding on the wood behind her head.
She doesn't want to hear as all the rest
Explain their situation, introduce
Themselves and point her out as she who brought
Them here and probably killed Buffy too.
She doesn't know why death keeps bleeding from
Her fingertips, infecting everyone
Around her. She should be locked up or kept
Away or sterilised somehow so she can't hurt
Another person. Now, of course, it seems
So obvious, the reason why no god
Has wanted her: she's trouble, far too much...
Her tears are back again and clutching bright
Around her sinuses, but even so
They only make her feel pathetic, trite
Because, when she is her, how dare she cry?
She wipes them angrily away and climbs
Back to her feet, heaves self and rucksack up
And to bunk that's farthest from the door,
Quite distant in the corner, curling tight
Around herself beneath the blanket, eyes
Now set wide open to the dim lamp light.
Her magic, hot and blue electric charge,
Is loosing current through her, something dark
Inside her, something running through her veins
Like blood, but quicker, something that she can't
Switch off, not now, not anymore. If she
Could ever switch it off then that's a skill
She's irrevocably forgotten, which
Is terrifying since she's still alone.
She can't imagine even Lise or
Gurpreet would understand this feeling, since
They've found the source of where they get their spells:
Elise's happy with the earth and all
That hippy stuff; Gurpreet, her dad is Sikh,
But, still, her mum is Hindu, so she seems
To understand what’s going on with her.
She thinks how Mr. Giles always (well,
Before she killed him), in his training talks
He always said that you could call upon
Whomever for a spell and usually
There wouldn't be a problem, but it paid
To be consistent (so he also said),
Because it wasn't strange for gods sometimes
To favour those who weren't consorting with
Their bitter enemies. She'd laughed because
She'd been so nervous; she remembers that.
But now she only knows that she's alone,
A killer and a fraidy-cat too scared
To help with fighting evil anymore.
For, after all, she is too scared (or scarred,
Perhaps?) to do a simple spell.
She lies
Tight curled up in a ball and feels the time
That passes, minutes ticking by. Outside
The voices are still murmuring; they saw
She can remember, how she stood, beheld
That power in that room. She saw the world
As nothing but that matrix, glowing threads
Of life, the future and the past clear cut
And dried and certain. When she made her choice
With Mr. Giles, fixed imperfections with
A darning needle fashioned from his life,
Eradicating every snag had seemed
So crucially important... Why? She asks
Of every scrap of magic in her - why?
She's not opposed to divination, since
It sometimes seems like prophecy is what
She's good at, even though she doesn't have
The sight. The future feels complete sometimes,
Or still elusive, but an image in
The distance, brightly shining slightly out
Of view - but even so she's never seen
Her task as shaping it so neat that life
Will fit a plan that someone else has made.
She wishes Buffy wasn't lost outside;
She said she understood and didn't blame
Her for Osiris' influence, was nice to her,
Was always nice since Xander brought her up
To Inverness from school. And so, you know,
She can’t be dead. She wishes she could tell
Somehow, repay her crime with usefulness.
But then, she thinks, her tarot cards, of course;
They work a different way, reveal the truth
Without the need for magic from her hands.
She opens up the toggles of her bag
And reaches past her clothes, remembers when
Her mother gave the cards to her: they were
Her most unwanted Christmas present and
A challenge (she was sure) to her desire
To study maths and sciences, a cri
De coeur made by a failed actress. (Oh,
She misses Mum and how her hugs would be
All Chanel No. 5 and pearls. But how
Can she go back and tell her what she's done?
Tell Dad about Osiris? Yet she wants
To go.) She'd never thought that she'd be good
With them, the cards, and yet from that first time
She sat there with her mum, spread out her choice
The way she thought looked sensible, ignored
The book and made up all the meanings, she
Has read them always with uncanny truth.
She takes the box and shakes it till the cards
Come out, then starts to shuffle them between
Her trembling hands, so worried that she can't…
She almost cannot focus - then, at last,
She's happy, cuts the deck and stacks it up.
There hasn't been a need to change the spread
That she worked out that time; she's always dealt
The cards the same. The first three cards, first row,
Are situational; they're simply past,
Then present, future. They will show if she's
Alive. Though Sadie hasn't ever read
For someone dead she knows she'll know the way
It feels (it's odd the way that having cards
Back in her hands can make her feel that warmth
Of glimmering confidence, no matter how
Short-lived). The Nine of Wands, reversed, her past,
Which isn't so important, still is not
What Sadie was expecting. There's a man,
A staff held in his hands, eight other staffs
Behind him; he should be prepared to fight,
Like Buffy must have been in Sunnydale,
But upside down the worry on his face
Is too apparent, all the staffs (that could
Be stakes) aren't helping him but might as well
Be falling round his ears. There's no one there
To hold them, not a friend or comrade with
A helping hand. He must feel so alone,
His hopes of others standing with him dashed.
And so she must have felt.
And then how she
Is now - The Chariot, reversed again,
A blond man sitting tall behind his team
Of sphinxes, the decision to leave home,
So obviously precarious now proved
Disrupted, broken; Sadie feels a catch
Inside her throat, can feel close-grinding gears
And axles of emotions dealing with
The sudden break of movement, feels the crash.
She's... Yeah, she's still alive, but not so well.
The future, though, is better, Six of Wands:
The laurelled victor riding on his horse,
Companions bearing staffs beside him; is
That Buffy though? The scene is giving her
The feeling that it's not, or maybe that
The victor is just victory; the wreath
That crowns the staff is more important than
The one that's worn. That there's a group, the bond,
That's also something, gladdening in the sun.
The smallest smile is lit on Sadie's lips,
For that is not a future to be feared,
Despite the darkness that has come before.
It makes her want to finish off the spread;
She's got her information, but the hope
That she is feeling isn't something she
Can happily let go; she wants the cards
To make her feel like this for all the time
They can. And so she deals another row,
The influences of events, the states
Of mind and heart and temperaments which brought
Them to fruition. First's the past, the Queen
Of Swords; and, oh, she sees her sitting stern,
Decisive, in control of what she feels,
No matter if it's sorrow. Others could
Have taken weapons, but she didn't think
She had to offer; then she didn't want
To show her discontent. Now Sadie's glad
That's over; what's the present? Knight of Swords,
So similar, but now they're in the midst
Of the decision-making, rushing wind
Around their ears, the sword held high, a man
So sudden coming. Yes, of course, you can't
Be driving chariots in weather harsh
As this, they're too unstable, doomed to crash
And make you carry on by foot, take care
And travel slowly to the change that meets
You in the future, falling underneath
The Hanged Man. There’ll be a change, she sees,
In them, the man strung up and upside down
To view the world a little differently -
And they will do it, forge their victory
From whittled gallows and some knotted rope.
They’ll make this different future theirs and she
Will leave the past strung up behind her as
She marches on.
The final row, the four
Last cards, should tell her, Sadie, everything
More generally, but she’s not sure they’ll speak
Of Buffy, rather than of her, since they
Concern the subject as a questioner,
Which should be fine as a description, but -
It doesn’t quite apply to what she’s done.
Still Sadie deals and sees the Ace of Cups,
Reversed, as the description of her state,
This questioner. It breaks her heart a touch,
As well it should, what with the cups the suit
Of flowing joy, emotion, hope - or so
The ace will bring out if it's nurtured, not
Upset and spilled like this cup is. The hand
That holds it on this card is pushing it
Away from all its native water, till
It loses every drop of feeling. Well
It could apply to her, so Sadie thinks,
If not to Buffy - since she doesn't know
Her well enough to judge. The second card
For this row is the outside influence
Upon the general way that things turn out,
And Sadie stills the second that she sees
The King of Wands. She stares at it so hard
The lines fall out of focus, every card
That lies across the yellow blanket is
A blur to her. Of course it would be him,
The card that is a father, noble to
The last but with the dark capacity
For strictness that's unyielding. It's him,
It has to be, it's Mr. Giles, who watched
For Buffy all those years, whose harried face
She sees in scowling disappointment, love
And every now and then betrayal, but
A teacher all the same. But then a flash:
That King of Wands is shown as someone else,
A figure sitting strict in judgement, with
His fists around the wooden handles of
His crook and flail...
Yes, Sadie's crying now,
Saltwater coming up to cloud her sight
That little more. She wishes now that she
Could not see visions in the cards this well.
Her shaking hand moves blindly forward, turns
Him over so there's only memory,
Her nemesis, still blazing from the spread,
But still it takes a while to muster up
The nerve to clear her eyes and let her sight
Fall on the Four of Swords - the way she feels
(Which she it's still not clear) within herself.
A tomb, a knight at rest inside a church,
Three swords still hung up ready on the wall,
Another carved into the shadowed stone
Of the sarcophagus. But he's not dead:
The knight is resting after battle, which
Could only be the case in tarot land,
But still she feels it, taking refuge from
The struggle in the peace of church before
He goes back to the front, takes up a sword
That's hanging ready for him. Is this her?
Or is this Buffy? She cannot believe
That what she's done permits such rest or that
She's feeling it in coming to LA.
Is Buffy though? Perhaps she is? The rest,
So Sadie understands, is not a rest
That's lazy; it's a ritual, bizarre
But somehow wholesome, like the knight entombed.
The final outcome also shows that sense
Of things: the Six of Swords, much calmer than
The future card of Wands, despite the suits
Suggesting quite the opposite. The swords
Aren't strife here, but simplicity, a clear
And piercing note of sweetness rising once
The battle's over, chorus of the dawn
That's singing on the journey home, across
The water like the picture shows, when they'll
Reflect on everything that happens here.
But even as she touches fingertips
Against that card she can't imagine how
It feels, and screwing shut her eyes against
The tears that come she doesn’t want to try,
But curls instead back down into the bed
And tries to make it dark enough to hide.
[V]
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