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Present Childe by Ariel Dawn
 
Reality
 
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Disclaimer: Not mine, ‘k?

Author’s Note: Some dialogue taken from “Dopplegangland” Beta’d by the wonderful Bloodytearsoflife
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Chapter 19: Reality

Buffy looked at Vampire Willow with awe. Willow made a pretty good looking vampire, it was true. Vamp!Willow’s face was already sporting her fangs and bumpies as she strutted onto the stage. Deftly, she grabbed Oz and smashed him against a fellow band mate.

“No more snuggles?” asked the real Willow to Buffy’s right.

Buffy nodded watching the vampire version of her best friend cross the stage. The two vampire women locked eyes.

“What the hell are you doing?” asked Vamp!Willow. “Grab her!”

Buffy put her hands on her hips. “You seem to think I take orders from you,” spat Buffy. “Watch me as I prove you wrong.”

Willow looked from her friend to the her vampire self.

“You are a fledge,” intoned Vamp!Willow. “You will do as I say, or you will die, painfully.”

“Ya,” started Buffy, her voice heavily laced with sarcasm. “I don’t think that’s going to happen. Sorry. Ten points for trying though.”

Vamp!Willow stepped up to Buffy with a frown. Willow stepped back out of the reach of her vamp self and away from the two vampiress’ who seemed to be marking territory.

“You are young,” continued Vamp!Willow. She sniffed. “And family. Childer. Who is your sire, Childe?”

Buffy stood just a little bit straighter. “William the Bloody,” Buffy said proudly.

Vamp! Willow circled Buffy slowly, assessing this new information. Unfortunately for Willow, as her vampire alter ego circled, she reached out and grabbed Willow’s arm.

A piercing scream from Willow filled the Bronze as Buffy rolled her eyes. Vamp!Willow held Willow, her neck exposed. Buffy smiled as she watched Vamp!Willow take a long lick of Willow’s neck, followed by a sniff.

“Awww,” Vamp!Willow moaned. “She’s marked.” The vampire’s eyes flashed. “You marked me!” raged Vamp!Willow, throwing Willow down.

“I let her do it,” offered Willow.

“What?” raged Vamp! Willow.

Her exclamation ended as Buffy hit her on the head with a chair.
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“I like her,” commented Buffy happily, as she, Giles, Willow, Xander, Anya, and Oz stared down at the unconscious and tied up Vamp!Willow.

They had brought her back to the factory, where Anya said she appeared in the other reality.

“She’s skanky,” observed Willow. “And so not like me at all! Look at what she wears!”

The collective group looked at Willow, who was still wearing her alter ego’s outfit.

“Are you sure we shouldn’t change clothes again?” asked Willow.

“No!” protested Buffy. “I think this look is very you!”

“What should we do with her though?” asked Xander. “She’s from another reality, where everything is opposite...Does that mean that I’m cool in her reality? I bet I’m cool,” he said with a goofy smile on his face.

“You were a vampire,” stated Anya.

“But a cool vampire right?” the boy asked.

“I believe the balance must be preserved,” note Giles. “She must go back from whence she came. I presume that you can perform the spell that can send her back?” he asked Anya.

“I can,” muttered the former Vengeance Demon. “I don’t want to.”

“Anya...” warned Buffy.

“Oh ok, fine,” started Anya, throwing her hands up into the air. “I’ll do what the vampire asks. Though I don’t know why it matters, a vampire is a vampire right?”

“Not true!” declared Willow in defence of her friend. “Buffy doesn’t snack on people!”

The vampire on the floor before them groaned, her eyes fluttering open.

“Then I suggest that we begin the spell to send her back,” continued Giles, beckoning Anya towards him.

“I’ll guard my Great Aunt here,” said Buffy pointing to the now awake Vamp!Willow.

“So, um, in your reality, I'm like this bad-ass vampire, huh? People afraid of me?” asked Xander of the captive. When Vamp!Willow rolled her eyes at him he started to giggle. “Oh, yeah. I'm bad.”

“I'm not sure about releasing this thing into the wild, Will. She’s not all full of the ‘humans are friends not snacks’ variety,” Buffy observed.

“I just can't kill her,” whined Willow.

“No. Me, neither,” admitted Buffy.

“I mean, I know she's not me. We have a big nothing in common, but... still,” continued Willow.

“There but for the grace of getting bit.”

“We send her back to her world, and she stands a chance. It's the way it should be anyway,” said Willow resolutely.

“Uh, we're about ready here,” stated Giles from the circle with Anya. “Don't you try any tricks now, dear,” he warned Anya.

“I don't need tricks,” she said in a pout. “When I get my powers back, you will all grovel before me.”

There was a collective eye rolling from the Willows and the vampires.

“Yes, uh, if you, uh, Willows,” started Giles. “Would like to, uh, complete the circle.

Willow turned to her vamp self. “Good luck. Try not to kill people.” And with that Willow hugged herself only to be put off by some naughty touching on the part of her vamp self. “Hands! Hands!”

Vamp!Willow gave a naughty smile before kneeling down in the circle.

Buffy looked on and a little part of her didn’t want Vamp! Willow to go. As the spell proceeded, the vamp and former Slayer thought she kinda liked the idea that one of her friends was a vamp too. ‘Course the evil part wasn’t good.
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The spell completed, the group returned to their somewhat normal lives. Anya went back to the mansion with a pout.

As Giles was about to leave the factory, Buffy pulled him aside.

“Where is Faith?” Buffy asked.

“Chained up in my bathroom,” answered the watcher.

Buffy tried to hide her amusement. “You can’t keep her tied up forever.”

“I realise that Buffy. I just don’t know how to...”

“Let her go Giles. I can handle myself,” Buffy assured him with a smile.

“If you think that’s best, Buffy.”

“She didn’t do anything but what she was trained to do. I think she’s been punished enough. She comes near me and mine again though, she’ll deal with me.”

“I’ll tell her that.”

“Do that.”
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Buffy settled into her bed at the mansion, thinking it was far too late to head to her mother’s house. It was lonely here without Spike.

As if on cue she felt his pull on her consciousness. He wanted her back. And he was hard and horny. The mental pictures he was sending her quickly got her aroused. He was remembering past encounters.

Her hand drifted to settle between her thighs as she sighed in anticipation of the flood of images and sensations that were going to envelop her.

She promised herself that tomorrow she was going back to him. Definitely tomorrow.
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Buffy rose from her bed in time for school the next morning, she had to say good bye to Willow, Xander and Giles, and make sure that Faith knew just what the sitch was if she decided to come after her and Spike again.

There was also the whole locker clean out thing.

Buffy walked down to the kitchen to get herself an early morning bag of blood to find Anya sitting at the new kitchen table, staring into a cup of tea.

“Morning,” Buffy muttered, heading to the fridge.

“Oh sure, act as if nothing happened. I’ll never get my pendant back. I’m stuck in this mortal coil until my body starts falling apart around me and I get all wrinkled and gross until my body just gives up cause I’m too old to carry on. I hate being mortal!”

Buffy looked up from the open fridge before her and shrugged. “Hey look on the bright side, there could be a giant big bad that’s coming to town that’ll eat you. You could go that way. Saves us from having to watch you decay around us. Mortals are gross. Smelly.” Buffy wrinkled her nose.

“But there is a power demon already here. The Ascension? Tell me you’ve heard of it?” patronised Anya.

Buffy looked at her friend with a curiously sceptical eye. “The who-huh?”
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“Giles? Ascension? What is it and how come I had to hear about it from Anya?” asked Buffy as she strode into the library an hour later.

Giles looked up from his perpetual book and squinted at his former charge. He closed his book hesitantly as if trying to formulate a response.

“Buffy, it was not too long ago that I was firm in my belief that you were an evil vampire and therefore must neither be apprised of the Slayer’s progress nor the happenings of the evil inhabiting this town. You had, if you will recall, moved your minions and your mate to LA.”

Buffy nodded. “Well, here now, fill me in,” she said sitting across from him at the library table.

“Uh, no,” came Faith’s voice from the stacks. “My town now, remember?” Faith stepped out from the stacks and walked down the steps towards Giles and Buffy. “You got vamped. Off the case. Go back to your vampire lover and let the Slayer deal with the baddies of this town.”

“Kudos to your new freedom, Faith,” started Buffy. “Don’t make me regret asking Giles to set you free.”

“You like to think that you have that much influence with him, you don’t. You are a vampire, that’s all. He knew it was time to let me go.”

Buffy stared back at Faith’s hating eyes and contemplated trying thrall out for the first time. It probably wouldn’t go over well in front of Giles. Still the fact that Faith of all people was giving her lip was getting her back up. Spike would never have let her do that kind of thing to him.

It was only then that Buffy realised that she was thinking like a vampire towards her childer and not like a Slayer to a fellow Slayer. It was so the time to leave Sunnydale.

Buffy rose from her chair and stepped towards Faith. She opened her mouth to tell the Slayer if she thought she could handle whatever this Ascension thing was, then fine, she’d just go get laid by her sex on legs mate.

Except then Willow burst into the Library, grinning and happy. And Buffy knew it wasn’t going to be as easy to tell them that she was going back to LA.

“Buffy!” gushed Willow, happy smile in place. “You’ll never guess what Snyder’s done to the cheerleading team!”

As Willow babbled on about the principal and his instance that all cheerleaders participate in the key club, fundraising for worthwhile causes instead of their own self interest, Buffy pondered just how she was going to say good bye to her best friend.

“You have unhappy face...” added Willow as she wound down from her babbling. “You are leaving, aren’t you? You can’t leave yet! We need you! Tell her Faith, we need her!”

Faith snorted.

Willow glared at the Slayer and Buffy swore that Willow’s eyes flashed for a moment.

“We need her, Faith,” intoned Willow, scarier than Buffy had ever seen Willow before.

“Whatever,” muttered Faith earning another glare from Willow.

The morning bell rung, forcing Faith and Willow to head to class.

“You coming?” Willow asked.

Buffy looked at Giles, then back at Willow.

“I guess,” Buffy said with a shrug.
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Buffy stared at the phone with trepidation. She sighed. She turned away from the phone, evil invention that was clearly staring at her, and paced a moment, before stopping in front of it and picking up the receiver.

And putting it down.

“Are you going to call him or not?” asked Anya annoyed, peering over her math homework. “’Cause if you aren’t, then go away. You are distracting.”

Buffy turned to look at the former demon with a glare. “Do you think it’s easy to phone the love of your unlife to tell him that you aren’t coming back to LA, until this year’s big bad is put down. Especially when he’s a past big bad...”

Anya dropped her pencil. “Enough! Phone him! Phone him now, before I have to listen to your excuses again.”

Buffy picked up the phone. She hated when Anya was right.
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tbc...






 
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