FIC: Finding the Slayer (7a/?) B/W PG

Author: Ivy Gort

Email: ivygort@xxxxxxxxxxx

Spoilers: Placed in Season Two, plot points from Season Seven

Rating: PG

Pairing: Buffy and Willow

Previous Parts: http://www.fanfiction.net/~ivygort

Summary: Buffy is injured by Spike and starts have strange dreams.

Disclimer: I don't own these character.

Feedback: Please!

Ann Marie is the Great BETA Goddess.

Special Thanks to BHV for prereading for me. BHV and Ann Marie have done and do so much work to help my writing it is unbelievable!

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Finding the Slayer Part Seven

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Willow crept along the outside wall of the hospital hoping that the charms she had made worked. The entire area was beautifully landscaped--especially if you were a vamp hunting for a snack. Tall bushes and trees made each of the sidewalks seem like a hike in the forest as they funneled the people to the entrances of the hospital. She paused behind an especially thick shrub, trying to hide. She thought the charms that she'd made out of Cordelia's make-up compacts would work but she wasn't going to just walk right up to the doors of the hospital. She didn't know what the Council would do, if anything, if they saw her, so she didn't want to take the chance. The Scoobs were Buffy's only hope.

She was only three feet from the employee exit, three feet, just two steps and she would be in the building. Two steps and they would be on their way to saving Buffy.

"What's the what, our intrepid leader?" Xander whispered behind her, keeping his voice low so that no one could overhear them. Volume, smell, everything Willow could think of was included in the charm's power. The only thing she didn't include, because it was impossible, was touch. Once they touched someone either by accident or on purpose they would be visible to that person. And yet, that was all theory, she didn't know if it would really work. "Why did you stop?" he asked behind her, crouching low behind another bush.

'Why did I stop?' she thought to herself, her hand flying up to the charm she had hanging around her neck, her fingers holding onto the smooth plastic. Her senses were reaching as far out as she could extend them. 'I'm not the one with the spidery sense, that's Buffy, still, I feel like this is a trap.' All her senses alert and open, Willow searched for the reason for her sense of dread, the sense that if she took just one more step she would lose everything.

"I hate to be the bearer of bad news, Will, but my legs are cramping," Xander continued to whisper behind her. Her searching eyes caught a slight movement and when she turned to look she saw the soldier. He had to be Council, only about five feet away behind another one of those huge shrubs. Even as she stared at him, the man wavered in and out of focus. The only thing she could see clearly was the lit tip of a cigarette.

'So I'm not the only one to think of a concealment spell. Mine is tied to a physical object in the ?real? world. It?s a charm that is anchored in this world. While the Council is a spell not tied to the world. Which means I might be able to bend it.? A counter to the Council's spell began to form in her mind. The counterspell had to be strong enough to show all the Council members and guards to her, but not completely collapse it. 'How? How can I make it so I can see them, so that Xander and Cordy can see them, and keep the spell up so that they don't know that we know, that they ? agh! Enough! Simple. I don't have all the power in the world like they do, so I have to stick with simple.'

"Will, can we ?." Xander's complaining faded into the background as Willow tried to relax the way Ms. Calendar taught her.

"Quiet Xander, I think something's up," she heard Cordelia whisper to him. And then her second sight opened and she could see at least five men arranged around the door to the hospital. It was a trap because even with the charms they never could have physically avoided all five men. What chilled her to the bone was that each one had a very nasty-looking gun. A real gun that looked like it could fire a bunch of bullets in just a short amount of time.

She took another deep breath and this time she tried to ground and center her mind. As she became more focused and was able to see the magic floating off of the Council guards, she saw dark strands of light surrounding each man. The power of the Council's spell stunned Willow; it took a lot of raw, sheer energy to be able to hide that many men from so many people. No one in the hospital would know that an army of Council members were right outside the doors unless they physically bumped into one of them.

Bile rose in her throat as she thought of the magnitude of the army arrayed before her. And she knew without a doubt that the Army was for her and not because of Spike.

Her fingers slid over the hard plastic of the charm that was so comforting a moment ago and now seemed like a death warrant. How could she have possibly thought that her insignificant dabbling in magic could match the Council's? 'You didn't,' her inner voice reminded her. 'That's the reason for the whole 'let's not be seen' aspect of the charm. That's why you used Cordelia's compacts because they are for covering up--hiding--shielding yourself so other people can't see you.'

Willow was able to calm her racing heart though the force of her will. She looked back at the soldiers and she found the dark magical strands that connected the Council's spell to her and cut them. Then she searched out the individual strands connected to Cordy and Xander and blocked them.

Xander gasped as the men appeared before him. "MP-3s!" His voice rose as he recognized the weapons the men were carrying. "They have MP-3s!"

"Shuss!" Willow said quickly as she turned to him. She didn't understand why it had been so easy to neutralize the Council's spell and at the same time she wondered why they hadn't been discovered. If she could block their very powerful and dark magic spell, why couldn't they block her simple charms?

'Because they wish to overpower, where as you want to hide, not be seen,' the annoying voice added. 'Remember Wicca isn't about power, it isn't about control over, it?s about blending with?.' Willow heard the words in her mind as if they had just been spoken to her; she remembered the first thing Ms. Calendar had tried to teach her. 'Block and reflect back at the attacker, use their power against them.'

Willow looked down at the plastic compact with the small mirror attached to it. And an idea formed in her mind. An anchor in the physical world would help.

"Will, I think we need to like, bolt?." She heard Xander's worried whisper and held up her hand to silence him. She licked her dry lips.

"Xander, just a second more?" She asked him, begging him with her eyes to stay calm for a few more minutes.

At his slight grin and nod, she turned back towards the men. Focusing this time was easier as she reached out to the dark magic and wove it into the mirror of each of her charms; she used the Council's power to form a shield around each Scooby. Making it so that the Council's spell would bounce back, the effect was that now both Willow's simple charm and the Council's powerful spell covered Willow, Xander and Cordy. Making them invisible, instead of merely concealed, to everyone in the hospital. When she finished, Willow was amazed that she wasn't tired, she was elated. They had a real chance to save Buffy.

"Alan, do you have another smoke?" The man that Willow had seen first lifted up a pack of cigarettes to the one behind him and Willow realized that was how she had known he was there. The Council's spell didn't cover up smell, so she had smelled his cancer stick. The Council's foot soldiers had gotten arrogant.

"So why are we here?" Alan, the soldier asked his buddy behind him. From Willow's position, she could see the bright face of a boy not much older than she was and with the same light complexion.

"Travers is all up in arms thinking the Slayer's best friend is some kind of mystical she-god that is destined to destroy the Council and bring about the end of the world." Alan's buddy told him and Willow could hear the disbelief in his voice.

"I saw her picture, she can't be more than 17. How could she have that kind of power?" The young soldier asked, looking back at his buddy.

Wisely, his buddy answered. "I don't know but I've read the account of their last battle. If the Slayer hadn't kicked ass, then the Council would be toast right now."

"Willow, this is nice to know. You are some kind of Warrior Princess but there are bugs crawling up my legs so can we please move?" Cordelia whispered, breaking the Witch out of her stupor at hearing why the council was so afraid of her.

"Yes, let's go around that way ?. I think I saw a broken window." She motioned for them to back up and go into the woods. If all the side doors were this heavily guarded they were going to be in trouble. Invisible or not they still couldn't touch anyone or the charms would collapse.

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TBC in Part Seven B