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"We love you, damnit! And we would do everything we could to keep you alive and you know what?" I reach out to her, grabbing her shoulders with my empty hands. "All of our efforts would probably have failed, because you are the Slayer!" She steps away from me, her eyes are so bright when she finally realizes that she has the knife, and there is nothing we can do to stop her. She pauses to feels the weight, the balance, like a warrior should do when given a weapon. " I know what Giles is thinking, that even if he fired a shot off now, Buffy would still have timeto plunge the knife into her heart. "My love gives me the right to ask this of you, and your love for me demands that you obey.? I know that I?m pushing it by using the word obey; Buffy never ?obeyed? anyone in her life. She looks up sharply, a retort forming on her lips. But I silence her like I did with Giles, with a wave of my hand. ?I ask you one thing and one thing only, if you insist on dying, on suicide?? I see her flinch again and I am relentless. ?You do it now,and front of us all." I can't risk a glance away from her to find out what the othersare doing so it?s a surprise to see Dawn step up next to me. "She's right Buffy; we can't stop you, we would try but eventually you would escape." Dawn reachesher hand out and runs it along her sister's arm. "I love you, when you were gone it was so awful ?? Dawn chokes on a sob, I see her swallowing trying to get her voice under control. The pain of four months without her sister nearly overwhelmed her, the thought of loosing her again ... it?s the same pain that I?m feeling now. Finally, Dawn?s able to continue, ?If you are going to leave me alone, then do it here, now, in front of me, I want you to see how much it hurts!" She screams, it?s not the irritating scream of childhood, but the painful wail of someone that is nearly beyond their tolerance. "Me too Buff," Xander steps up behind me and he too reaches over to touch Buffy's arm. "I love you, I've loved you from the first moment I saw you. Over the years it's changed," he gives her that half-smile he does when conceding a point. "It's changed, it's grown, you are still my hero. And I know that you love me.? He tells her as he steps around me to rub her back with his other hand. He too starts to cry; only his tears add fuel to the fire of his words. ?If you are going to die, if you?re going to kill yourself, then do it now, and watch me die with you.?Cause that's what happened last time when you jumped off that tower. I died." And I can feel herbeing crushed by a totally new force, not the painful agony of a remembered place, but by the solid wall of love beginning to engulf her. "I say, you all are nuts!"
Giles comes into the group from behind Dawn. " For the first timein the confrontation Buffy looks up and meets someone?s eyes. She stares into Giles? bright ones. He's trying to hold in his tears and failing miserably. He gives her his patented fatherly shrug. "I told you before you died jumping off the tower, that you are everything a Watcher could want in their charge." He pauses to gather himself, it's made all the harder to see because he's normally so reserved. "What I've neglected to tell you is that you are everything I could ever ask for in a daughter. You are the daughter of my heart." He then takes his daughter in his arms, holding her, trying to enforce his words with the sheer force of his love. "Please don?t die again, for if you do you will take my heart with you." Dawn joins their embrace, "Live Buffy, please live for us." Xander joins in and I see the mighty Slayer totally engulfed in the love of her friends, of her family, safe in her father?s arms. Her legs give out and she's held up, supported, loved. I have no place here so I start to turn around--I know her decision--she's not selfish. And it's going to be a long hard road for her, and for me. I can't stand to watch, I don?t know what I feel at the moment?love yes, I love her with all my heart?I?m still human though and I?m now faced with the reality of her words. ?I hate you, don't you understand I hate you!? She had cried. And just a few minutes ago I was so sure that was a lie, I was sure she loved me too, if only as a friend, why can?t I believe it now? I start to walk out of the room, I need to be alone, I need to re-gather the peace I felt last night with Giles. I can feel Osiris beating on the lid to the prison in which I have contained him. But I hear her words! I have to go, I have to escape, get out of the room before she sees me fall apart ? ?I hate you, don't you understand I hate you!? Her voice follows me, it won?t leave me alone. It echoes back and forth in my mind. It?s bouncing from one side of my head to the other, growing louder and louder, drowning everything in its wake. Until I can?t think, I can?t see, I can?t feel. I stumble into the wall by the doorway?the noise of her screaming is deafening me?I can?t stand it. It?s assaulting me, but as the physical pain increases, it nothing compared to hearing the truth?she hates me, she will never love me, she will never forgive me, and I don?t deserve it?I am damned. The damnedare doomed to live forever without love, without peace, with the hate of the people that they wronged to keep them company ? I can?t deal, I am just so tired I want it to stop. I don?t want her to hate me! I stumble away from the wall, I?m so confused, I know I felt Buffy?s love, I knew those words were just said in anger or pain ? now they seem to be the truth. I can?t live this way; I can?t live knowing that she hates me! Please I want it to stop, I want all this confusion and pain to end. ?Just make it stop!? I scream. I hear a man say ?thank you, I will.? And then?. I feel a hard shove from behind ? but instead of falling to my knees, I?m forced up, I?m pushed up into the air. I close my eyes and brace for the impact against the wall ? that never comes. When I open my eyes, I have a moment of disorientation because of instead of looking up to see my friends I have to look down ? I look down and into the face of ? me. Only I?m not me, because my hair is now pitch black, and my eyes are dark bottomless pits. ?Osiris.? I whisper but no sound comes out of my incorporeal lips. He?s won.
End of Part Seven Bright Blessings,
Ivy
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