Chapter One--North
Carolina--Aftermath of Hurricane
Max
Buffy watched as the
land in front of them gave way to what appeared to be the Atlantic
Ocean. Only at this distance something looked wrong with it. She
blinked, her eyes trying to bring it into better focus. Flying in a small plane
was an experience that she didn't want to repeat anytime soon. It seemed like
every breeze made the plane dance around the sky, which made her stomach
slightly queasy. She had never been subjected to motion sickness before so she
could only blame it on the feeling of imminent death the plane gave her. That at
any second something would happen and they would be plunged to their deaths on
the hard ground below. That's why for most of the trip she had firmly kept her
eyes on the horizon, hoping that the old seafarer's trick would work in a plane.
Willow had been very
quiet for the entire trip and Buffy didn't know if that was because she was
concentrating on keeping the craft in the air or because of the company. The
hacker hadn't said more than a few words to her since taking off in
Cleveland. All she had done was hand
Buffy a set of earphones and a nice pair of sunglasses.
Willow's silence had hurt
at the beginning of the flight but as the minutes grew into hours Buffy decided
to just let it go. In a way the
Slayer was happy for the lack of conversation, as uncomfortable it as it was.
She felt for the first time in a long time that she had a break from the
pressures being the Slayer Prime had forced on her She still felt betrayed by the
hacker, or ex-hacker for all she knew.
All Buffy really knew was that Willow blamed her for what happened and
there was nothing she could do about it then and now, eight years later, the
situation hadn't changed.
As they got closer to
the coast Buffy couldn't help but notice that the rivers and streams had changed
color, from a bright blue to a dark brown. Buffy had seen muddy rivers before,
but they didn't look like was she was seeing right now. They almost looked
like?
"Welcome to
North Carolina: The Toilet of the
Country." Willow's ironic and bitter
voice through the earphones interrupted Buffy's thoughts. Or, if possible,
confirmed her thoughts; though her mind shied away from the
possibility.
"Huh?" She spoke into
the headset microphone. Taken aback
by the anger she could feel coming from
Willow. She had grown used to the sullen silence
so it was a shock to hear her speak.
"Still so articulate
Buffy?" She sniped and glanced over to her. Buffy could feel the plane beginning
to bank, going into a slow circle. The mighty Slayer grabbed onto the dashboard,
and wondered if it was called a dashboard in a plane? But as she relaxed she was
able to look out her window and straight down for the first time. Buffy saw that
some of the streams and rivers were out of their banks and what she thought were
small islands were actually a few houses.
Willow took the plane
lower and Buffy could see thousands of bloated corpses that appeared to be pigs
flowing downstream among of the bits and pieces of debris. Still her mind just
couldn't accept what Willow was
telling her or the images that were forming.
"That's kind of a
harsh thing to say." She told
Willow, so that she wouldn't have to
think about the child she just saw wading through the water. She wanted to ask why
Willow was angry, because of what
happened eight years ago or because of the environment.
"Buffy,"
Willow started, and the Slayer
flashed on Giles' lecture voice for a moment, feeling herself instantly
interested in what her friend had to say. Dawn had told her that
Willow was a popular Professor at
Duke
University. With the respect she
commanded by a simple vocal tone change Buffy could well understand why that was
so.
"Buffy,"
Willow repeated to make sure the
Slayer was listening. "North
Carolina is the fastest growing state in the country.
Its town's sewage treatment plants can't keep up with demands under normal
circumstances, so those towns dump the overflow raw sewage directly into the
waterways." Willow's voice took on a
harder edge and Buffy watched as her jaw clenched.
"Well I'm sure it's
not that bad?." Buffy started. And she really couldn't imagine anyone;
especially the entire political structure of a state, could be so dense. Think
of the lawsuits if someone got sick?
"You really have been
fighting demons too long." Willow
laughed sarcastically, it hurt Buffy to feel like her former best friend was
ridiculing her. Something the old
Willow Rosenberg would never have done. "You see that building down there
to the right?" Willow pointed at a
long building that looked like it was made out of tin, with a pond next to it.
The pond was overflowing into a brown stream, turning the water an even sicker
shade.
"Yes." The Slayer
answered as her stomach became queasy for an entirely different reason than the
motion of the plane. Because that water was flowing into the front yard of the
child she just had seen.
Willow continued. "That's
either a hog farm or chicken farm. There are over 5000 industry-run "hog farms"
in Eastern North Carolina. Each has its own waste pond.
When it rains over 4 inches, which it does quite a bit, those ponds overflow and
dump untreated or raw hog feces into the waterways and streams." She told Buffy,
and now that they were nearly on the coast the Slayer could see the dirty water
flowing out of the mouths of the rivers and staining the crystal blue of the
Sound brown. "It's especially clear after a hurricane because instead of one or
two overflowing treatment plants or ponds they all do."
Willow continued as she leveled the
plane and now Buffy realized what was wrong with the ocean--the blue green was
being overtaken and changed as well.
And Buffy thought that
maybe some of Willow?s anger was
directed at the sickness below them and not just at her?
"I wouldn't eat any
shellfish from the southeast for, oh, the next ten years or so? that's if
North Carolina doesn't have
another hurricane in the meantime." The red head finished bitterly. Now they
were flying over tiny strips of sand and as they came closer Buffy saw entire
houses floating in the surf.
"That must have been
some hurricane." Buffy said, pointing out the destruction and feeling bad for
the child she saw.
Again
Willow disagreed. "No, hurricane Max
was only a Category Two. The real damage was inland flooding." Then the red head
glanced down at what Buffy was seeing.
Willow shrugged, "When
you build a house or a community on a migrating sand bar then almost anything
will knock it down." She faced Buffy to see if she made her point. ?And you know
what the sad thing about it was Buffy?"
Willow asked, facing the Slayer and
for the first time meeting her eyes.
?Is that it?s cost over 6 billion dollars to rebuild these
island.?
"How is that sad? I mean the people have to have their
houses fixed, they have to be able to live." Buffy answered, her guts clenching.
She was used to handling death, and to certain extent destruction, just not on
this scale.
"That's true; but most
of the inland families can't afford flood insurance and a lot of insurance companies in NC will not put
storm damage in their homeowner policies, because of the costs of these
hurricanes have on the islands.?
Willow turned back the face the
Slayer. ?Four years after Hurricane
Floyd over 10,000 people in one county were still living in tents and trailers
because their houses were flooded out. Over 100 miles inland, their houses were
flooded in a real natural disaster and they never recovered ?. But
Sea
Island resort or the Ramada Inn was
back in business 3 months later." Buffy could hear more passion than anger in
Willow's voice even over the tinny
sound of the headset.
"I no longer "fight
the good fight" against vampires and demons,"
Willow said, begging Buffy to
understand with her eyes. And for a
second they were back at Sunnydale High and
Willow was telling the Slayer that
she was staying to fight by her side.
For the first time since before that awful snowy night in
Cleveland the Slayer felt a
connection to her best friend. And
no matter the time and distance, Willow Rosenberg was still her best friend ?
even if the redhead didn?t know it.
"I don't fight against
that kind of evil Buffy but I do fight the good fight against another kind. I
just fight with words and facts now, instead of stakes and magic," she finished
quietly, glancing away as the wall of anger and distance rose up between them
once again.
To Be
Continued in Part 2b