By
Paradox761
http://members.tripod.com/~Paradox761
Disclaimer:
Joss and co. own all things Buffy, and SFC owns Stargate. No copyright infringement is intended, so
please don’t sue. I don’t have any
money anyway.
Dedication:
To Helen and Nikki, for whom I do everything.
And my angels, Jordan and Jessica, may they rest in peace.
Summary:
Three years after the end of the series (BtVS), a group of former Scoobies have
a new mission. Kicking interplanetary
undead ass.
Author’s
Note: Special thanks to DaBear, Sirius, Miss Kayl, Big G, Rob Clark, Darklight,
Eykar, S.M., charmedfanatic3000, Alexandra, slbwhitewolf, Mytryk, Calia,
WBH21C, RickW22, lmichelle1, Jwolf, Enjael, Jen007,
Thundertb and weirdfrog for the feedback.
It’s much appreciated.
(BtVS/SG1, W/X)
*
(4/?)
Colorado
Springs, CO
It had been five days since Willow was introduced to the Stargate program, since she learned about the existence of things that she never would have imagined exist. But she hadn’t spent that time learning more about different alien species, or alien technology, or the physics of wormhole travel the way she would have liked. No, she was buried hip deep in a good old-fashioned demonic mystery. She was almost disappointed, but she understood the importance of her task. How did vampires, and demons as well she assumed, get off of Earth? This question was fundamental in understanding exactly how big a problem they were facing.
She
had already worked through and dismissed several hypotheses. One, demons evolved on other planets
naturally. She and Daniel looked
through quite a few tomes of history and mythology from various alien races,
and found no reference to vampires or demons that she recognized. More importantly, it didn’t make sense that
vampires would evolve exactly the same way on another planet as they had on
Earth. And the vampires SG-8 had encountered
seemed to have the same strengths and weaknesses as the Earth variety. Theory number two, dimensional portal. Since demons all originate in one way or
another from some kind of Hell dimension, she theorized that Hellmouths could
have opened on other worlds, and vampires and demons could have spread from
there. But again, the evolution
followed too close. The vampire that
came through the gate with SG-8 was burned by a cross at one point in the
fight. This was very telling Willow
thought. Which brought her to her
current theory. At some point in the
past, a group of vampires and possibly other demons somehow left Earth. Most likely, through the stargate.
Willow
was trying to put together a library.
She never realized how much she had relied on Giles’ books until they
were gone. All of her books were about
magic, not demon history. If the SGC
was going to put together a team for the purpose of fighting demons on other
worlds, than they would need a decent research library. They gave her a room on the base to work in,
as well as quarters where she could stay.
Day by day, more books came in, and her workspace was looking more and
more like Daniel’s. She was spending so
much time in her burgeoning library that Xander had taken to bringing her her
meals there so she wouldn’t forget to eat.
She
found a few references to the Chopa’aye, the Goa’uld word for stargate, in
several of the demonic history texts she had acquired, but only in
passing. Nothing she could find went
into any detail as to how, when, or why any demons used it. Or more importantly, where they went. It was time to pull out the big guns she
thought, as she dialed a now familiar number into the telephone on her new
desk. It rang a few times before
someone picked it up.
“Hello.”
“Hey
Giles, it’s me, Willow.”
“Willow,”
Giles said, a smile in his voice. “How
are you?”
“Oh,
I’m okay.”
“I
haven’t heard from you in a few weeks, is everything okay? How’s school? Are you having fun in the, oh what do they call it, the big
apple?”
“Actually,
I’m not in New York anymore. I’m in
Colorado.”
“Ah,
I see,” Giles said, not sounding too surprised at all, which just confused
Willow. “Helping out Xander then.”
“How
do you know about that?”
“He
wrote me, a week or so ago. He
mentioned that he found a new mission, as he put it. Said he was going to ask a few of you for help. He wanted to let me know in case I needed
any of you for an emergency or something.
I had a feeling you’d go.”
“Did
he ask you to come?”
“No,
he mentioned that he knew how busy I was here in London, otherwise he would
of. He said it was another reason he
was writing, he didn’t want me to feel slighted should I hear about it through
the grapevine.”
“Did
you get the message I left for you the other day?”
“About
the books, yes I got it. ‘Tobin’s
Prophecy Guide’ and ‘Gray’s Demonology’, not your usual fare. But now that I know you’re helping Xander,
it makes more sense.”
“I’m
trying to put together a little research library. Nothing like yours of course, much more meager, just enough to
get us by, you know.”
Giles
chuckled. “It’s all right Willow, I
understand. Is there something specific
you’re looking for?”
“Actually
yes, that’s one of the reasons I called.
Have you ever heard of something called the Chopa’aye?”
“It
sounds vaguely familiar,” Giles said.
“What is it?”
Willow
paused, choosing her words carefully.
“I don’t know much, only that it’s a portal of some kind. I’m looking for any instances of demons
using it en masse.”
“Give
me a moment.”
Through
the phone, Willow could hear the sounds of typing. “Giles, am I hearing what I think I’m hearing?” she asked with
quite a bit of surprise.
The
typing stopped suddenly, almost as if Giles had been caught doing something
illegal. “I…well, that is…” he started
before sighing. “In my absence the
Council had computers installed in their main archive, much to my dismay. I only use the infernal thing out of
necessity.”
Willow
smiled. “That’s the same reason we all
use them Giles, it’s nothing to be ashamed of.”
“Yes,
quite. In any case, I believe I’ve
found what you are looking for. Have
you ever heard of the Last Age?”
“The
Last Age of the Demons, right? The end
of demon rule on Earth, when humankind finally drove them away.”
“Exactly. There’s a reference here to one of the Old
Ones, a demon by the name of Ro’chok.
It says that during the end of the Last Age, he led his legions through
something called the Chopa’aye. The way
the word is used implies it’s a portal of some kind.”
“Does
it say where the portal led to?” Willow asked.
“It
may. There’s a portion of this text
that was never translated. Some kind of
symbolic language, almost like Egyptian hieroglyphs. Council scholars spent years trying to decipher it, but they
never found the language it was written in.
It isn’t anything we’ve ever come across, human or demon.”
“That
sounds like exactly what I’m looking for,” Willow said. “Giles, can you send me a copy of that text,
along with anything you can find about the Last Age and this Ro’chok guy. It’s important.”
“Can
you tell me what this is about, Willow?”
“Actually,
no, I can’t.”
“I
thought as much. Xander’s letter was
very cryptic as well. I trust that you
two know what you are doing.”
“We
do Giles, I promise.”
“All
right, I trust you both. I’ll have the
books and documents for you in a few days.
Tell Xander I said hello, and to be careful, both of you.”
“We
will Giles. Thanks again.”
“Any
time. Feel free to call me, even if the
world isn’t ending. I always like
hearing from any of you.”
Willow
briefly wondered if Giles was taking guilt lessons from her mother. “I will,” she said.
“Take
care.”
“You
too. Bye.”
*
“We
come in peace?! Why didn’t you just say
take us to your leader!”
“Hey,
I didn’t hear you coming up with any bright ideas!”
Xander
and Willow sat back to back on the floor of the cave, tied together, their
wrists and ankles bound. One burly
looking human with a sword stood a few feet away watching them. Their captors had yet to say a single word
to them, or each other for that matter as far as they could tell. They just poked them a little with their
swords and pushed them to the ground, where they tied them up. They didn’t even take Xander’s gun from him,
probably because they didn’t know what it was he surmised. Willow had dropped her zat before they tied
them up, and Xander’s was out of his reach on his thigh.
It
didn’t make sense. These humans had
obviously been fighting the Chaos demons, and the two of them hadn’t done
anything threatening toward them.
“Why
would they tie us up?” Xander wondered aloud.
“Why
wouldn’t they?” Willow said. “They
don’t know us. If they’ve survived this
long on a planet with Chaos demons, my guess is they’ve learned to be
cautious.”
Xander
nodded. “Hence the no talking.”
“Sound
echoes in a cave. Looks like they’ve
learned to live silently, to avoid attracting any unwanted attention.”
“So
what do you think they’ll do to us?”
“Looks
like they’re deciding that right now.
Look over there by the fire.”
Xander
looked and saw a group of men gathered by the fire, including the one he had
seen earlier with the claw marks on his chest plate. They were gesturing at each other, speaking in some kind of sign
language. Their body language told him
that Claw, as he nicknamed him in his head, was definitely the leader. “Ah, so that’s why my ears are burning. Why don’t they just talk to us?”
“We
don’t even know if they speak English.
Or if they remember how to speak at all.”
Xander
looked at the man who was guarding them.
“Hey, Stinky. Your breath smells
like wet dog ass, and your feet are on fire.”
The
man looked down at his feet, which were perfectly fine. He looked back up and sneered at Xander.
“Oh,
that’s a good idea, antagonize them more.”
“At
least now we know they understand English.”
The
guard pointed his sword at Xander and grunted.
‘I
don’t think he wants us to talk anymore,’ Willow said in Xander’s head. Xander pulled his fingers across his mouth,
miming a zipper. The guard sneered
again and backed off.
‘Yeah,
I got that impression too,’ Xander thought.
‘We
have to tell these people that we’re not their enemy, that we’re here to help
them,’ Willow thought.
‘I’m
open to suggestions.’
Xander
looked over at the fire again, at what he assumed were the leaders of this
group gesturing at each other. Claw and
another man with a bushy gray beard seemed to be arguing. Every few seconds the man with the beard
would point at them emphatically.
‘Check
out Grizzly Adams over there,’ Xander thought.
‘I don’t think he likes us very much.’
‘What
did we ever do to him?’ Willow added.
A
few more minutes of arguing, and Xander saw Claw dejectedly nod his head, like
he was reluctantly agreeing with whatever point Grizzly was making. Grizzly then motioned for two other men to
follow him as he turned and headed straight toward Willow and Xander.
‘I
think we’re about to find out.’
Grizzly
stopped a few feet away and glared down at them. When he spoke, his voice was quiet but powerful.
“I
am Tribe Second. You will answer my
questions.”
Xander
could tell that he wasn’t asking, he was telling. “Sure,” he answered, keeping his voice as quiet as his.
“How
many are you?”
It
was English, but by the way he stumbled over the words, Xander could tell he
hadn’t spoken it in a long time. “Just
the two of us,” Xander lied. He still
didn’t know what these people were going to do to them, and he wasn’t going to
put Riley and Faith in danger.
“How
did you survive attack on stronghold?”
“I
don’t understand.”
“How
did you survive?”
“We’re
not from around here, we’re just passing through. We want to help you.
We’re not your enemy.”
“You
came from the demon tunnel. You have
betrayed us to them.”
“What? No, no we didn’t betray you to anybody. The demons are our enemy too.”
“You
betrayed us to save your own lives.”
“No!”
Xander insisted. A little too loudly
apparently, the two men on either side of Grizzly stepped forward and pointed
their swords at him. “Sorry,” he said,
lowering his voice again. “We didn’t
betray you, we’re here to help you. We
can take you someplace safe, away from the demons.”
“Only
safe place is caves. Stronghold fell to
the demons.”
“No,
we’re not from any stronghold. We’re
from another…place, very far away, where there are no demons. We can take you there.”
Grizzly
shook his head. “You try to trick
us. The tribe has decided. You are to be put to death for your
betrayal.”
“What?!” Again the guards pointed their swords at
Xander.
“The
safety of the tribe must come first.”
“No! We’re not your enemy, we’re trying to help
you!”
“Silence!” Grizzly gestured to one of the other guards,
who produced two strips of cloth. He
walked over to Willow and Xander and gagged them. Xander reached for his P-90, but the guard saw him and stopped
him. He took the gun away, looking at
it strangely. Xander mentally kicked
himself.
“The
safety of the tribe must come first,” Grizzly repeated. “May the gods have mercy on your souls.”
*
Sullivan’s
Tavern
Colorado
Springs, CO
Xander
downed the rest of his beer a put the glass down on the bar. “Set us up again, Sully,” he said to the
bartender.
“What
are we doing here, Xander?” Riley asked from the stool next to him. He slid the empty glass in front of him
closer to the bartender as he set two more full glasses of Guinness in front of
them.
“What
are we doing? We’re celebrating the
fact that we’re still alive. We almost
bought it back there on that rock,” Xander said, taking a sip of his beer. “Not to mention five days of living off of
nothing but rations and rainwater makes a man appreciate a good beer.”
“It
doesn’t feel like we’re celebrating,” Riley said, taking a sip of his own. There was an awkward pause. “Listen, about what you said back there on
that planet…”
“I
thought I was going to die, Riley. I
wouldn’t take anything I said too seriously.”
Riley
could tell he was trying to play it off, but he had a feeling that there was
more to it than that. “You can say what
you want, I think you were being real.
I’m your friend, I’m not going to say anything to anybody, you know
that. But what you said, if that’s
really how you feel, I think you should do something about it.”
Xander
snorted a bitter laugh and took another drink from his beer. “It’s not exactly that simple,” he
said.
“Somebody
once said that life is the process of going from absolute certainty to absolute
ignorance. It happens to me again and
again. Just when I think I’ve finally
got a handle on things, that I might actually know what I’m doing, somebody
pulls the rug out from under me and turns my world on its ear. Back in high school, I thought I knew what
the world was all about, and then I found out bloodsucking demons were walking
the street. After Sunnydale became a
crater, I thought I knew what evil was, and then I met Jack and found out that
evil extended a lot farther than my narrow mind could comprehend.
“And
now, my own heart betrays me. I’m
finally starting to realize that I’m not certain about anything anymore.”
“Are
you still sure we’re here to celebrate?” Riley asked.
Xander
looked dejectedly down at his beer.
“Yes,” he said after a moment, looking up like the realization just
struck him. “Absolutely. Listen to me, feeling sorry for myself. I’m alive, I’ve got great friends, a great
job where I get to make a difference and help people. We *should* be celebrating.
I guess that’s the point, right?
Nobody is certain about life, nobody’s got a handle on things. That’s what life is all about, throwing you
curve balls.”
“Wow,
you get philosophical when you’re drunk,” Riley observed.
Xander
ignored him. “You just have to
remember. That’s what I need, something
to remind me of what I do, why I do it, and the people I do it with. Something to remind me that I don’t need to
be in absolute control of my life, just control the way I handle it.”
Xander
stood from the barstool and reached for his wallet. He threw a couple bills down and patted his friend on the
back. “Come on Riley, we got one more
stop to make tonight.”
“Oh,
Xander, I don’t know. Sam’s already
going to kill me when I come stumbling home tonight. If I show up with a tattoo she’ll make me sleep on the lawn.”
“I’ll
let you sleep on my couch.”
“Okay,
let’s go.”
Xander
smiled and called down to the other end of the bar. “Sully, we’ll see you Monday night for the Raiders’ game.”
“Take
it easy, Xander,” the bartender called back.
The
two friends walked out of the bar, leaning on each other more than a little,
and headed straight for the tattoo parlor on the corner.
*
Willow
and Xander sat bound, and now gagged, on the floor of the cave. The home of what appeared to be the last
group of humans left alive on this planet.
Several of which were now sharpening swords, preparing for their
execution. Xander was mentally beating
himself up as he tried to subtly reach for the zat on his thigh. It was no good though, the rope that wrapped
around he and Willow kept his arms from reaching far enough.
‘Stupid,
stupid, stupid,’ Xander mentally chided himself.
‘Xander,
this isn’t your fault.’
‘The
hell it isn’t. I take it you can’t make
with the mojo.’
‘I
can’t move my hands, and I can’t speak, which means I can’t cast.’
‘If
I’d just kept my mouth shut they wouldn’t have gagged us. Damn it!
Can you reach my zat?’
‘No. Even if one of us could reach it, you’d only
get a couple shots off before they killed us.
And I don’t think that would go a long way toward proving that they’re
wrong about us.’
‘Too
late for that. We can’t convince them
of anything if they won’t listen to us.’
Xander tried reaching for his zat again, but there just wasn’t enough
give in the rope. ‘Damn it!’ he cursed
again in his head. He let out a groan
of frustration as he let his head fall back against Willow’s.
Xander
forgot for a moment that Willow was listening to his thoughts. ‘This is exactly what I was afraid of. I was right, I can’t cut it. And now Willow is going to die, and it’s all
my fault, and there’s nothing I can do about it. If I could just…reach…DAMN!
I’d kill every last one of them if it meant saving Willow. Or at least I’d die trying, instead of tied
up and slaughtered like an animal.’
‘Xander,
no,’ Willow projected. ‘You can’t think
like that, don’t ever think like that.’
Xander’s
head shot up as he remembered she could hear what he was thinking. He realized what nerve he touched,
remembering what happened after Tara was killed. Never had he understood it as much as he did now.
‘This
is *not* you’re fault. What do you
mean, you can’t cut it, that this is exactly what you were afraid of?’
Xander
wasn’t going to answer at first. He was
trying to keep all of this from her.
But one look at the men sharpening their blades changed his mind. ‘End of the line,’ he thought. ‘No reason to hold anything back now.
‘Back
on PX-1109B2, I had a lot of time to think while me and Riley were lying in
that ditch. Maybe they made a mistake,
making me a Captain, putting me in command of SG-13. I led us straight into that ambush, and we almost didn’t make it
out alive. You want to know why I was
so eager to go on this mission? I
convinced myself that I was wrong, that I *was* good at my job. I wanted the chance to prove it to myself,
that I do know what I’m doing. But I
wasn’t wrong. I’m unfit for
command. I have no right to wear this
uniform.’
‘Xander,
how can you say that?’
‘How
can I not? We’re sitting here about to
be executed because I screwed up again.
I’m sorry, Willow. I’m sorry I
got you into this. I’m sorry I couldn’t
just let you live a nice normal life in New York.’
‘Xander,
I love you, but you’re thick in the head, you know that?’
‘What
are you talking about?’
‘First
of all, you didn’t force me to leave New York, it was my decision. Just like it was my decision to stay on with
the SGC, just like it was Faith and Riley’s decision. We know the risks. Secondly, not everything bad that happens is your fault. Yeah, it was an ambush, but you couldn’t
have known that. We had bad intel, that
wasn’t your fault. And when we started
taking fire, you were calm and cool, and you got me and Faith out of there
right away.’
‘What
about Riley?’
‘You
made a command decision, and a damn good one.
If you had ordered Riley to go too, you would have been overrun and
killed, and we probably never would have made it to the gate. Making hard decisions is what makes you a
great commander. It’s the reason all of
us are alive right now. You more than
deserve to wear that uniform, and you more than deserve to lead this team. And I know for a fact that Riley and Faith
feel the same way.’
‘If
I can’t trust my own decisions…’
‘Questioning
your decisions doesn’t make you a bad leader, it just makes you a good
person. You care so much, Xander. More than I thought humanly possible
sometimes. You care about everybody,
and you care about doing what’s right.
It’s the reason I…it’s the reason I love you.
‘I
wasn’t going to say anything, but like you said, no reason to hold anything
back now. Ever since that day, when I
thought…that I might lose you, ever since that day all I can think about is how
much you mean to me. I can’t remember
my life without you in it, I can’t even imagine it. You’re a part of my soul.
Maybe once I thought that was just friendship, and maybe once I took it
for granted. I didn’t realize until I
was faced with the very real possibility of your death, until my heart sat at
the bottom of my stomach for five straight days…that I love you. I love you, in every definition of the word,
in every way humanly and inhumanly possible.
I love you.’
Xander
didn’t say anything. He just turned his
head and leaned it against Willow’s.
She closed her eyes and leaned back, the barest hint of a smile on her
lips. If they truly were about to die,
then she was glad she told him, no matter how he felt. All that mattered was that they were together. That’s all that ever mattered.
Minutes
passed, or maybe it was hours. They
came and took off the rope that held them together. They pulled them to their feet, and cut the ropes binding their
ankles so they could walk. Xander
thought, as one of the larger men led him by the arm, a quick elbow to his
stomach and he could grab his zat. Then
maybe…
‘Don’t.’
There
was no hope for them left. Even he did
get free and get a few shots off, it wouldn’t be enough to save their
lives. It would just be killing for the
sake of killing, and that’s the last thing Willow wanted in her name. He understood that.
They
were taken closer to the fire. The
women and children were out of sight, which was to be expected. They stopped in front of Grizzly and a few others. Claw was nowhere to be seen, which surprised
Xander. The guards removed their gags
and pushed them down into a kneeling position.
Xander’s eyes never left Grizzly’s.
To his credit, he didn’t look happy about what was about to happen. Xander understood. If they truly believed what they said, that the two of them were
sent to somehow lure them out for the demons, then they really had no
choice. For the good of the tribe. Xander understood, but it didn’t mean he was
going to make it easy for them. So he
stared at him, daring him to look away, to show any kind of hesitation in this
bloody deed. Grizzly never looked away.
After
a moment, the guards, or executioners he supposed, pushed his head forward so
that he was looking down at the ground.
Xander could feel the point of a sword touching the back of his
neck. At least it would be quick and
clean, he thought. One swift stroke and
lights out.
“I
love you too, Willow,” Xander said in barely a whisper. “I’ll see you on the other side.”
Grizzly
raised his hand, preparing to give the signal.
‘As
I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil…’
“Wait.”
It
was Grizzly’s voice, and for a brief instant a glimmer of hope flashed inside
of Xander.
“Take
their clothes, we can use them.”
And
just that fast, the glimmer went out again.
Xander rolled his eyes. Why do
they have to prolong this anymore, just do it.
They
cut his hands free and started pulling at his jacket. Xander pushed them away and took it off himself. He stripped down to his tee shirt, and when
he pulled that off he heard the guard next to him gasp. Xander looked up and saw the man looking
down at him strangely.
He
didn’t even see Grizzly step closer to him.
He hoisted Xander to his feet, and stared intently at his bicep. The tattoo, Xander’s tattoo, that’s what
they were looking at he realized.
Grizzly poked at it and rubbed on it, looking at his hand to see if it
came off. Of course it didn’t. He turned to one of his men. “Find the Tribe First, tell him to come
here,” he ordered. “Go, now!”
*