FIC:(repost) On Occasions 10.B (1/2)

[Mad Hamlet <Mad-Hamlet@xxxxxxx>]

Disclaimer: All this belongs to Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy(Grr..arrggh)


Drain Brameged Inc. Proudly Presents
A Mad-Hamlet Production


On Occasions;
In The Heart



The ardor cooled a while ago. 

Ha, I got to use ardor in a sentence. I'm just so bad, yes I am.

The rooms gotten cold, or maybe the passion just wore off. First Buffy
cuddled up next to me
for heat and then after that wasn't enough she pulled the covers over us, than
snuggled back down, curling up next to me, laying her head on my chest, the
fingers of her hand idly drawing patterns on the skin of my belly. She's been
quiet for a while now but I'm not overly concerned. 

Buffy gets that way sometimes. A memory snatches her attention and she
follows after it for a bit. With my comment about old reliable, and all the
events that ensued after the previous time it was used, I can't say I'm very
surprised that she's sorta drifted off. Whether it's because of the afterglow,
the warm sunlight that's a thick, heavy yellow color; the mark of a sun just
on the horizon, lancing through the blinds, or just that I'm tired, but I find
my own thoughts drifting away. 

I run my fingers through Buffy's hair while her nails continue their tracery
on my belly. I lay my head back and remember...


I had gone to the library figuring it was the best place to meet Buffy, I was
in a rush, wanted to get there before she left on her patrol. Lots of reasons
why, I didn't want her concern for my state of mind clouding her judgement.
Yeah she went on lots of patrols, and mostly there were newbies out there. It
didn't ever change the fact that every night she was fighting for her life.

Her life!

Which was also my life. Enough said on that matter. Of course I had meant to
go earlier but I'd completely lost track of time having had to worry about my
homework and that...that....jock! 

It was a good thing that I had already sworn off of boys or I would have
seriously considered doing so. 

So I was rushing down the hall and pushed my way past the double doors and
entered the library. Well, I thought it was the library. Didn't feel like it
anymore.

Haven't you ever walked into a room and you can just 'know' what kind of a
room it is? It might be a study, or a den, or the kitchen but you can just
feel how much it's been used. And you can say to yourself, 'Yeah, this is the
den, and the living room is through that door, but this is where the family
gathers. This is where children play with their parents and the family bond
was made.' You know what I'm talking about? 

The Library didn't feel like the library. It felt like a morgue.

Giles was sitting in between Xander and Buffy, who herself was not exactly
sitting but sprawled across the few steps that lead to the second tier of the
library. Giles and Xander were staring at nothing. Their eyes were open
certainly enough and it wasn't like a hunk o'nothing had materalised in front
of them. 'Cause that would be impossible, since nothing, not being a something
cannot exist therefore it is nothing but it wasn't actually nothing because
nothing can't actually exis... You know what I mean.

They looked lost. 

Buffy though...

She wasn't staring at nothing, she almost was nothing. People put out vibes,
something, that lets you know, or gives you an idea at least, of what's going
on. Call it empathy, or subsubconscious understanding of body language, facial
expressions whatever. It's there.

For Buffy it wasn't.

My footsteps seemed to double in volume with every step I took and I will
freely admit that I was on the verge of a panic attack. 

"Uh..hi guys!" I said, trying to force a cheerful tone. At that time, and
even now to my own ears it sounded rather weak. Squeakish.
"What's...uh...what's going on?"

Xander's head shot up to look at me and I saw something on his face that I
thought I'd never see directed at me. 

Hate. 

I'd seen Xander angry, I'd seen him direct that power at others. Angelus, and
Spike. Never at me though. I didn't like it and I didn't understand it at the
time. Xander can hate so well; because it doesn't belong on him. He's a funny,
happy person. A...bright kind of person and seeing something so black and...
He's got such a nice smile and it's almost always there. Seeing those features
twisted like that...it hurts. Even remembering them directed at me, with the
space of time and understanding, it still hurts now. 

He lurched at me and I thought he was going to hit me. In that instant so
many thoughts flashed through my mind. Was someone hurt? Had he found out
about Buffy and I? Was this his reaction? Had he hurt Buffy? What was wrong
with Buffy? And Giles? What was going on? What had I done?

The large wooden cross shoved nearly into my face cut off such thoughts. 

"Back!" Xander shouted at me. "Get back demon!"

I had a brief flash of extreme confusion. 

"Buffy!" Xander shouted over his shoulder. "Get a stake, she would have
wanted it this way!"

I opened my mouth to reply, to protest, to query. To do something!

Something was done, but not by me. By Buffy. I was looking at her the entire
time, I hadn't taken my eyes from her, not since I had first entered the room.
I watched her speak. Her eyes, which had been unfocused and empty moved over
to look at me. She watched as Xander confronted me, I saw her mind working.At
first she seemed puzzled, that small crease between her eyes saying so, then
some sort of realization, some expression of recognition flittered over her
face. I almost began to sigh in relief when she started to say something.

"No!"

It was only a whisper, but it carried clear across the room, across the space
dividing me from her, from Buffy. In that one utterance I heard such sadness
and pain. I had no idea what was the cause but I was going to go there, be
there for her. Lend her my support.

I brushed past Xander and his cross, ignoring both the puzzled expression on
his face and the sudden question popping in my head. 'Why would they want to
stake me?' 

"Buffy?" I say quietly approaching. 

"No!" She shrieked it that time. An exact opposite of her earlier utterance.
I'd never heard anyone sound like that before. I saw pictures in my mind of
drowning people, of screeching tires on out of control cars and toddlers in
harms way as mothers watch helplessly. "No, please no! I can't do it again!
Not again!"

Then Giles was standing in front of me. I thought it was Giles. He was taller
somehow. Colder in lots of ways that I instantly understood. 

"You will not touch her." His voice was tight, clipped. The skin pulled tight
over the bones on his face. I'd seem him like this once before, only once.
When we'd confronted the owner of the Costume shop last Halloween. Before we'd
known Giles's background. Before we knew about 'Ripper'.

The last time Giles had spoken to me using that face I couldn't help myself
but to obey. He'd told me to go, so I went, and now he was using it again and
I had to get past him. Why were they doing this? What was wrong? Had they
found out about me and Buffy? Had we been that wrong, she and I, and somehow
missed the fact that our friends, our family, were rampant hatemongers?

"You wear the face of someone we all loved." Giles resumed speaking. He took
a step toward me, being as threatening as possible. "But it's just a face now,
the person is dead. You will not decieve us, and you will not get near the
Slayer. I am not looking at my friend Willow, I am merely looking at-"

"Giles." I interupted. I should have been hurting. His words were so cruel,
and cutting, delibertely chosen to be so I guess. If it had been any other
situation I would have been devestated, reduced to a ball of emotional pain.
But Buffy was hurting and that was all that mattered. She had the back of her
left hand pressed over her mouth, muffling her whimpers, tears, a cascade of
them, made her face shiney and wane in the dim lighting of the libraray.

"Giles," I said. "I don't know what's going on, and I really want to find
out what I've done to make you and Xander so angry at me but I just don't have
time. So...so.." I took a deep breath. "I'm sorry."

That caught him off guard, he crooked an eyebrow and the tightness of his
face vanished. 
"Sorry?" He asked in a confused voice. "What for?"

"For this." I said and kicked him in the shins as hard as I could.

It has to be a genetic thing, because he remained totally british. Giles
just grimaced a bit bent over, grabbed the wounded limb then, without a word
of protest of exclamation, wobbled, lost his balance and toppled over.

I darted around him to where Buffy was still slumped on the stairs. She'd
watched the interaction between me and her watcher silently, except for the
repeated moaning into her hand. When I stepped around Giles her eyes shot open
wide. A strangled squack burst from her throat.

She started crab walking backwards, trying to climb the stairs to get away.
She wanted to get away, to run and hide. To run from me. Her limbs flailed
about and all sense of grace she had she lost. A hand slid out from under her
and she crumpled. Curling up into a fetal position, an arm wrapped around her
eyes, keeping her from seeing, not letting her know. Know what? Her other hand
waved in the air feebly trying to fend some terrible something from advancing
on her. 
	
"Buffy?" I whispered trying to get past her flailing arm, even half trying
her strength was formidable. "Buffy baby, it's me." 

I grabbed her hand in my mine and she didn't fight back when I restrained it.
Buffy could have, she could have just twitched a shoulder muscle and lobbedme
clear across the room. She didn't though, and in some ways that terrified me
more than anything before.

"Stay away, please stay away." I heard the catching in her throat. She was
fighting back sobs. Something terrible had happened. "Don't come near me.
You're not her." She continued. "Not her, not her, not her, not her. Don't
make me do this again, please. Not again!"

She was shaking, her skin clammy and moist; almost feverish. I'd seen her
earlier that day, at school and somehow between then and now something had
come along and sucked all the vitality out of her. Everything was limp and
cold. I could see the actual effort it took for her to rembember to take her
next breath, and I got the impression that, if she'd had a choice, she
wouldn't have.

She'd been hollowed out. 

Gutted.
	

"Buffy, Buffy!" I said more fiercly. "It's alright, I'm here. Whatever it is,
I'm here. We're here. It'll be okay, I promise, I'll make it okay." Not
giving a damn if Giles and Xander saw, I pressed her hand to my lips. 

"See?" I whispered in between kisses to her fingertips. "I'm here." I lowered
my voice even more, bringing my lips to her ear. 

"I love you." I barely breathed.

Nothing.

I got nothing. No reaction, no stunning realization that whatever was wrong
wasn't. She was too far gone and I, for a heart stopping moment thought I'd
lost her. That whatever was causing this pain had been to much, had conquered
her spirit and she had gone away, far away, somewhere to hide. 

That wasn't an option that I was going to allow.

I released her hand, it landed on the floor with an audible thud. Pulling the
hand she held over her mouth away I cupped her face in my hand, capturing her
eyes with mine, not letting her look away.

"What happened Buffy?" I say quietly. "Please tell me. I won't hurt you. What
happened?"	
Her eyes rolled wildely in their sockets and I shook her head slightly to
restablish contact.
She looked at me with terror. Her pupils were huge. They eclipsed her eyes
entirely almost, some darkness inside eating her up. She was scared. 

Scared of me.

"What happened?" I repeated softly. Only a sliver of space between her lips
and mine. Where, on other occasions, that space had been one of delight, and
teasing, now it was an impassable canyon. 

"You," She whimpered a few times. Her voice small and frail like a child who
has lost her parents in a big scary building. "You were cold." She chokes
out.

"You were cold." She repeated, fresh tears squeezing out her eyes and overmy
fingers. "Cold inside and outside. Dead and cold and gone and you were cruel.
So cruel, you liked it too. You could have done horrible things, you wantedto
do horrible things. I could tell. You couldn't wait to start hurting others.
Yet..." 

She moaned in the back of her throat and tried to look away. "You were still
so beautiful." She croaked. "Cold, monstrous, bloodthirsty and...and..." She
drifts off into silence.

"And?" I encouraged her slightly, my mind was buzzing with this infomation.
Everything that had happened in the last, what, five minutes? Was just
swirling in my mind. I should have figured it out but it was too much too
fast. Xander, the Cross, Giles speech, I should have figured it out, thought
how would I have been able to believe?

She looked up at me again, this time of her own free will and I had to steel
myself not to look away. She was so haunted! "And I still wanted you!" She
keened. 

It was a quiet wail of despair. Not some full throated howl, just a light,
whispy, cry. An infants failing, dying whisper. 

It was horrible.

I swallowed a few times trying, desperately to think of something. 

I stroked her cheeks with the pads of my thumbs, smearing her tears and
mascara. The black rings of the makeup gave way to reveal black rings under
her eyes that I could not wipe away.

"Do..."I swallowed again. "Do I feel cold Buffy?" I whispered to her." I
gently blew my breath across her face, causing her eyelashes to flutter shut
briefly. "Do I feel cold?" I asked again.

"Can't you feel it Buffy?" I started sliding my fingers from her hairline to
her neck. "Am I not warm?"

I lowered my lips the last few centimeters and pressed mine to hers briefly.
It was a chaste kiss, but it meant everything at that time. 

I was there.

I was alive.

I loved her.

I was warm.

When I pulled away, her trembling hands were resting on my shoulders. As I
looked back into her eyes the haunting terror was still there, but less so,
now diluted by confusion. 

"But..." She gasped. "But..your heart-"

"Is yours." I interupted her. 

"But it was dead!" She insisted.

Releasing her face I pulled her one hand down, over my shoulder and along my
front till her palm was resting on my chest, directly over my heart.

"See for yourself." I whispered. The last shreds of my self control were not
weathering this whole sitch well. I could feel myself falling away somewhere.


"Can you feel it Buffy?" I whimpered. "It's my heart. It's there and real and
alive and beating.; beating for you Buffy. My heart is scared though Buffy.
I'm scared. Why? What's happening Buffy? Feel my heart Buffy. Come back to me
please. Feel my heart and come back to me!"

Said mucsle was hammering against my ribs, I could feel it thundering in my
ears, so hard and heavy that my brain was ringing in my skull. I was terrified
too I realised. Something had attacked her, attacked us and it had
destroyed...or it would destroy..Buffy unless I stopped it and I knew I was
about to start panicking and that would have not a been a good thing and
everything would have fallen apart and just-

Then Buffy grabbed me.

She sandwiched my face firmly between her palms, her eyes looking me over and
over again. Again I felt like time slowed down. Her skin, her hands, were so
hot, the skin rough and strong, yet soft. She cupped my left cheek with her
one hand and slowly stroked my bangs away from forehead with the other. 

"Willow?" She asked. She sounded kinda silly actually, I mean, of course who
else would it have been, I was right there and it's not like I was wearing a
disguise. But it wasn't silly. It was the most imporant question in the world.


"Yes." I said quietly. "I'm Willow. I'm here. I'm alive. I love you and I'm
not ever going to leave you."

She was quiet for a moment. Studying my face intently, like looking for
something wrong with it. Something alien and obcene so she could finally
decide to trust again, or run and hide forever. 

After a few seconds she made up her mind.

"I thought I lost you." She squeaked. 

Before I could reply with the obligatory and oft repeated 'Never' she was
pulling me down. Looking back on it I think I was still aware that Giles and
Xander were right behind the two of us. I was aware of how Buffy and I might
appear, laying on top of each other, her hands clasping my face and whispering
in far too an intimate manner. I also am pretty sure I didn't care. I know I
don't now. 

She kissed me. In front of Giles and Xander, she kissed me. Okay, we kissed
each other and I don't know how I knew, and I don't care how. I just knew it
was something that had to be done, that she needed and it was right.

Kisses taste good. If you love someone you're kissing. Heck, if you love them
enough morning breath kisses can still taste good; as long as you're careful.
When kisses with someone you love taste right though...

She...Buffy.. it was. I was enveloped in warmth. Yeah, physically it was
french kiss, but it wasn't. She was... asking for something; an affirmation
and I gave it freely and she offered and I accepted. Over and over giving and
recieving and giving again, never taking though. Never, ever taking. 

Her legs wrapped around me and I felt her rubbing them along the back of my
calves. She released my face and slid her arms down my shoulders and wrapped
them around my back. I whimpered into her mouth when her fingers slid undermy
sweater, scraping my skin.

It was the whimper that did it though. 

Probably a good thing too. I don't know if we could have stopped ourselves.

> > From behind me I heard the quiet sound of someone clearing their throat.

I reluctantly pulled away from Buffy and she let me go. Whatever wound she'd
been dealt long since healed, I think. She was looking at me now. AT me. And
she was smiling. I should have felt fatally embarrased but I didn't. I just
smirked down at her.

"We're so seriously busted." I whispered to her. 

She lifted her head and nuzzled my cheek with her own. "I don't care." She
purred in my ear. "You're alive."

I quirked an eyebrow. "Arn't I usually?" 

	

There is only one thing that can damn me.
That can send me down in a swirling maelstrom of fire and pain.
And it is not the word of Man.
And it is not the lessons and rules of the Church, hypocrites every one.
And it is not the words of God, nor the judgements of Angels.
And it not a fair tribunal of my 'peers' that can find me guilty of crimes
immortal.
No. 
I can only be accused, judged and damned by my own Soul.
And I would never be so betrayed.

Mad-Hamlet