Adult-FanFiction.org : Buffy

What a Mother Wouldn't Do	By : QueenB Category: -Buffy the Vampire Slayer > Het - Male/Female > Buffy/Giles Views: 5213 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Buffy the Vampire Slayer (BtVS), nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 8
- 9
- 10
“The Green Lady,” Clem stated.
The others stared for a moment. “Wait, that’s it? You know who she is?” Willow demanded.
“Positive. That description you gave pretty much meshes with what little I’ve heard about her. She’s supposed to be an elder demon, one of the really really really old ones.”
“Ha! I knew it!” Buffy crowed. “No one just locking lips like that with another woman’s guy could be up to any good.”
Clem peered at her. “You remember her? That’s weird. You shouldn’t be able to do that. Is it ‘cause you’re pregnant?”
“How do…no, no way! I’m not pregnant! I’m just, uh, getting fat. It’s all those sugary snacks treats. And I just can’t stay away from those candy bars. Bad Buffy,” Buffy babbled. She didn’t get it. She was wearing a large coat. It didn’t flatter her at all but she thought it hid her bulging belly very nicely.
“What are you talking about? I can hear the heartbeat from here.”
“You can? Do all demons have super senses? Geez!” The Slayer threw up her hands.
“They’re not super senses. We just don’t have dull human sensibilities, that’s all. And it’s not all of us.”
“Yes, this is rather fascinating. But we can discuss the nature of demonic auditory abilities at a later date. Right now, the business of the Green Lady is rather pressing. And the matter has become personal.” Giles shifted closer to Buffy, his hand once more resting protectively on her stomach.
Buffy laid her hand over his. “So what’s the what on her?”
Clem munched on a cookie and mumbled with his mouth full, crumbs spilling on to his shirt.. “She doesn’t mingle much in the demon world since she’s not interested in vengeance or preying on the human population at large. But I’ve heard a few tales of her in my time.” The demon sat at the Magic Box table and took another bite of cookie. “This is really good stuff. Do you have any Darjeeling tea to go with this?” he asked Mr. Giles.
“No, I don’t normally--”
“Forget the tea,” Buffy said with impatience. “How do we kill her?”
Clem belched, knocking crumbs from his lips on to the floor. “How should I know?”
“Hello? You’re a demon. Don’t you know how to put the kibosh on one of your own kind?” Xander demanded.
He huffed in exasperation. “You’re a human. Do you know how to kill another human with your bare hands? I understand some of you can do that. Kinda impressive seeing as most of you have zero skills when it comes to fighting.”
“Well, actually…” Memories of his Halloween night costumed as a soldier sprang to mind. At times he could recall exactly how a soldier would behave in threat situations. Dark thoughts of taking down ordinary humans would flash across his mind and he shivered. He wondered if this was how Willow felt when she used magic.
“I don’t believe it. I spend hours tapping away at the keyboard and he knows just like that. Oh yeah. Life’s fair.” Willow was understandably miffed. Her searches on the Internet had turned up nothing on Ms. Icqueen, proof positive that she wasn’t who or what she claimed to be. Not that that had been much. Giles admitted she hadn’t mentioned anything solid about herself during his encounter with her in the Magic Box except that she came from an old family that knew about vampires. He’d been rather distracted after that and hadn’t probed her further, something Buffy was still ticked about.
“Well, I knew about the Green Lady too,” Anya said defensively. “I could have solved this mystery months ago if I’d been working in the Magic Box instead of being locked in the backroom by meddling romantic do-gooders.”
“I don’t see how, Anya. Ms. Icqueen…”
“The Green Lady,” Clem interjected.
“As you say,” Giles said with irritation. “Ms. Icqueen seems to be throwing a glamour over herself that causes people to forget her.”
“Only humans. She can’t trick other demons like that,” Clem added. “So I’m afraid she would have fooled you, too, Anya.”
The former Vengeance demon glared at Clem. He ignored her and reached for a cookie set out on the plate nearby. “These are swell. I just love these Entenmann’s. Don’t suppose you’ve got any kittens around here, do you?” he added wistfully.
Buffy jerked the plate of cookies out of his reach. “Ugh. No. No kittens. And we’d like a little more about our resident baby kidnapper. So spill it.”
“Well, it’s like I said. She doesn’t mingle much with other demons. Legends have it she was one of the elder demons who got trapped here millennia ago when humans started taking over. Other demons opened rifts and escaped to other dimensions. She got stuck in this one.”
“So what’s the deal with the baby snatching? She eating them or what?” Xander asked.
“The rumors say this world’s atmosphere is kinda sick-making to her child…”
“That’s right! She was holding a baby that night I saw her!” Buffy exclaimed. She thought about that for a second. “But you say she’s millennia old. Her child couldn’t still be a kid, not after all this time. Unless this is the latest baby she’s got. How many of them do you think are out there?” Buffy frowned as she wondered if there was a whole species of baby-snatching Green Children in the world.
It was as if the Clem read her mind. “There’s only one Green Lady and only one of her babies. The rumors have it that the child can’t grow up here or get any better. It’s sickly and weak so she has to keep taking the blood from human babies in order to sustain its life force. It’s really sad,” he murmured.
“I’ll say. All those human mothers losing their children. Just think of the countless babies she must have been killing just to keep her own kid alive,” Willow replied, her lower lip quivering.
Clem blinked. “No, I meant sad for her.”
Willow blinked. “Oh. Right.”
“She’s always trying to keep her kid alive but she can never watch him get older or take care of himself. It must be hell for her, staying around for millennia and hearing him cry and knowing that he’s never going to get any better or stronger.” Clem shook his head and snatched up a chocolate chip cookie.
“Watch me not care about the evil demon who’s preying on human kids,” Xander snarked.
“Xander! Don’t be so unfeeling. Demons love their children, too,” Anya chided.
“Yeah, the way D’Hoffryn loved you? He torched Halfrek in front of you just to make you suffer, An. I was there so don’t deny it,” Xander shot back.
“That was discipline, Xander.”
“It was mental torture, Anya. Or did you forget his little speech about going for the pain?”
“Guys, focus. Let’s get back to the newest Sunnydale demon in our midst.” Buffy turned back to Clem. “What I really don’t get is why she’s showing up here now. There hasn’t been a boom in babies being born. So why the sudden interest in the droolers of Sunnydale?”
“Low housing prices?” Anya asked.
“Hellmouth energy?” Dawn chimed in.
“Free cable?” Xander flashed a half-hearted grin. “Sorry. X-Files flashback.”
“Beats me,” Clem shrugged. “According to the legends, she usually hangs out in Scotland.”
“Ooh!” At Willow’s exclamation, she waved her hands frantically at them. “Giles, Mr. Seversen!”
“Quite. This fits another piece neatly into the puzzle. When we talked to Mr. Seversen, he stated how he’d brought his forest back from Scotland. He may have inadvertently abducted Ms. Icqueen and her child with the shipment when he brought them over here.”
“So now we know the how of Ms. Ice Queen,” Buffy said.
“And we know the where. If Mr. Moneybucks accidentally hijacked her with his truckload of greenery, then we know where she’s got her little hideout. The only problem is tracking her down in 75 squares of forest.”
“No problem, Xander. I’ll just cast a locator spell. If she’s anywhere in that forest, I’ll find her,” Willow vowed.
“You’re not doing it in here, Willow. I do not want scorch marks on the property. You did enough damage the last time you went ballistic.”
“That was just the once, Anya. I’ve gotten better at it since then.”
“Prove it. Only just not here because I don’t want to be undoing any more of your mess.”
Giles thought it was a good idea to step in at this point. “I believe as co-proprietor of the store I’m entitled to some say in this. Let’s cast the spell in the backroom in order to minimize any possible damage.”
“That’s right. Just override your business partner in favor of your long-time friends,” Anya grumbled. “But Willow can use her own ingredients. If she uses stuff from the store, she can buy it like everybody else.”
“I don’t need your stuff, Anya. I’ve found people who can manage just as well. And for considerably less than Ms. Gouge-the-Customers.”
Anya sniffed. “Don’t forget: you get what you pay for.” Willow turned her back on Anya pointedly, picked up her large duffle bag and marched to the weapons room.
“You can’t do that, you know,” Clem piped up. “You can’t search for the Green Lady like she’s any other penny ante sorceress. You think you’re the only humans who tried tracking her down? She’s found a way to shield herself from spells and stuff like that.”
“She’s never had to deal with one Willow Rosenberg, the bitchiest among the witchiest,” Dawn said, defending her friend.
“I agree. A woman who nearly destroyed the world is nothing to be sneezed at. So this Green Lady had better watch out,” Anya added.
Clem thought their confidence was a little misplaced. “You still can’t just scry for her or whatever you’re planning. She moves around a lot, scouting out her victims, always on the move for fresh meat, if you’ll pardon the expression. How are you gonna find her without something definite to lock on to?”
“Perhaps we can’t scry for her. But we can certainly find one of her victims.” Giles reached into his pocket and pulled out the crumpled picture of Margie and Rosalind. Somehow he hadn’t been able to make himself discard it and now he was glad he’d refrained.
Willow grabbed it and nodded in approval. “Right. I can get the magicks to focus on the kid and presto! One Green Lady served for the slaying.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Buffy started.
“Which you will not be a part of,” Giles said.
“Oh no, Rupert Giles. You are not leaving me out of this.”
“Buffy, please. It’s as Anya said. You are in no shape to fight and I don’t want to be distracted while I worry about your safety--and that of our child.” Seeing that she was wavering, he whispered, “Don’t do this for me. Do this for that future we discussed, the one we both want so badly.”
Buffy bit her lip and he knew he’d won. The breath he took in relief was knocked out of him however when she threw her arms around him and squeezed. “All right, you win. But you’d better come back alive or I’m slaying your sorry butt.”
“No doubt, my dear. Now if you’d kindly relax your grip, your husband would like to breathe.”
Clem watched this exchange and quickly scooped up the last of the cookies, tucking them into his armfolds for later. He edged quietly towards the storage room with its underground exit.
He liked Buffy and her friends well enough, thinking them pretty decent for humans. But he didn’t want to be drawn into this fight if he could help it. Getting into a barroom brawl was one thing. He wasn’t about to get involved in a fight involving an elder demon.
__________
The ingredients were simple as was the spell. A map of Sunnydale was laid out on the floor and the picture with the two females placed carefully within the protective circle. A glow began to hover over the gaily-colored square of paper. The bright yellow circle wavered indecisively and then scattered over a large portion of the map. There was a flash and then flames burst from the paper.
“Ack!” Dawn yelled. She jumped up and stomped on the burning paper with her feet. When the flames were finally out, she picked up the ruined paper and stared ruefully at the burn marks.
“Was it supposed to do that? ‘Cause I’m thinking that spell needs work,” Xander said, poking at the singed holes.
“Either that or you’re out of practice,” Buffy added.
“Hey! The spell was perfectly easy. Dawn could have done it,” Willow protested. “I’m thinking there was some kind of jamming going on.”
“Magical interference?” Giles asked.
“Bingo. The glow should have focused onto one particular spot. Instead, whatever magic is at work made the light scatter over the general location of Rosalind.”
“So we’ve got ground to cover. Lots of ground to cover.” Dawn peered at the burnt section of the map. “Any clues on how we search 75 miles of green stuff? I’m thinking we shouldn’t do it in the dark.”
“That’s acres, actually. Considerably larger than a mile.”
Dawn puffed out her lips. Giles could be so numbing with the knowledge sometimes. “Geo lesson aside, any clues as to how to track her down in thick, woody woodiness?”
“Once we get past the tree line, the light may be fairly dim no matter what the time of day. Still, Dawn does have a point. Best to do this during the daytime,” the tall Englishman replied.
“And if you get caught?” Buffy pointed out. “What’re you going to say to the groundskeeper?”
“Do these places even have groundskeepers? And are they like Willy from the Simpsons? Hey, he was a Scotsman, wasn’t he? ‘Git out of mah forests, ya filthy liddle erchins!’” Xander mocked in a gross parody of a Scottish accent.
Giles removed his glasses and polished them studiously, doing his best to rein in his temper. Now was not the time for Xander’s jokes.
Buffy noted his irritation. “So I’m thinking night work is the best way to go here.”
“Cool. So instead of hanging out in a creepy graveyard, we can trip over ourselves in the dark in a creepy forest,” Dawn smirked.
“That’s the life of a Scooby. We live for danger,” Xander boasted.
“And sometimes die for it too,” Anya added.
“I’ll give us locator stones. That’ll help us find each other and I’ll leave one in the car so we can find it. We can also use this.” Willow pulled out a velvet bag and removed the large shiny oval-shaped rock it contained.
“Oh my god! This is a Froebling rock!” Anya cried. She grabbed at the rock only to have Willow snatch it out of her reach. “These are extremely rare and expensive as the earth! Where did you get hold of this?”
“I kept in touch with the coven in England. I asked about certain magical items. I-I thought this might come in handy someday in case, you know, somebody else decided to kidnap Dawn.”
“Hey, I don’t get kidnapped any more. This Key girl doesn’t open anything, remember?” Dawn replied, crossing her arms in familiar defiance.
“Whatever. We can still use it. It’ll punch through most cloaking spells and glamours. But it needs a lot of energy and concentration. The user gets kinda drained from it so it’s a last resort kind of dealie.” Willow hefted the stone and replaced it carefully in its purple velvet bag.
“So we’ll get our trusty, shiny weapons and go loaded for bear.” Xander bounded towards Buffy’s weapons chest and lifted the lid, rooting around in it for an axe.
Buffy watched him and the others wistfully. Giles hugged her and whispered, “I promise to be careful, Buffy.” As was so often the case these days, one hand drifted down to rub and caress her stomach. Giles’s tenderness at such moments never failed to move her. No matter how fat and ugly she got, he never shied away from her body.
Tears welled in Buffy’s eyes and she sniffled. She squeezed him back, mindful of his lesser strength this time. “I know, Giles. I just wish I was going along with you.”
“I do too, dearest. I can’t think of anyone I’d rather have at my side than one Buffy Summers. I shall have to make do with your sister.”
“Are you two gonna grope each other all night or are we gonna track down this mean green bleeding machine and give her a dose of good old-fashioned Scooby butt whoop?” Dawn demanded.
Buffy released Giles reluctantly. “You take good care of him, Dawn, or you’ll never hear the end of it.”
Dawn rolled her eyes. “Promises, promises.”
“You just sit down and take a load off, little lady. The men folk will look after the women,” Xander added.
“You are just enjoying yourself way too much, Xander. Chances are it’ll be the women taking care of your sagging butt.”
“Hey, who are you calling Sagging Butt? Have you looked in the mir--” Giles grabbed him by his free arm and began dragging him out bodily.
“Say anything disparaging about any portion of my wife’s anatomy and I will leave a part of your body in the woods for the birds to peck at. And wouldn’t that be a disappointment to Anya?” Giles murmured.
“Are we talking castration, Giles? No castrating of Xander. Not now when we’ve just started having the sex again.”
Willow brought up the rear, making a face at Buffy. Buffy shook her head and clasped her hands, miming a mock prayer. One way or the other, the Green Lady was going to be in for it.
__________
They paced through the darkened woods, weapons at the ready. Giles didn’t like this one bit. Within moments, they’d lost sight of the car and the trees around them were proving oppressive in terms of visibility and mobility. He hacked high on the trunks, blazing a trail with white slashes in the wood so they could find their way back. But, if they needed to make a stand and swing in the tangled vegetation, the swords might prove more of a hindrance than a help. Perhaps it might have been better to wait until daylight. But another baby could be dead by then...
“See anything, Giles?” The voice came from close beside him and he had to resist the urge to yelp. He could have sworn Dawn had headed off before him.
“Not a blasted thing, unfortunately. You?”
“Nothing but us and the trees. I can see well enough. Good thing there’s moonlight.” She halted a moment. “Giles. Do you feel that?”
He lifted up a tree branch so he could scoot under it. “Feel what? Did you hear something?”
“Kiiiiinda.” Her voice drew out as she tried to puzzle out what was troubling her. There was a sense of mystery and menace coming from the forest around her. But she couldn’t put her finger on it and the uncertainty was making her nervier by the minute. “I can’t get a fix on it, though. Maybe it’s just general ookiness at work--you know, the Hellmouth sending out Hellmouth-y vibes.”
“Mmmmm.” “General ookiness” didn’t qualify as what he’d consider a precise reading. So he put it down to nerves. Goodness knows he was feeling the strain. “Let’s push on, shall we?”
Dawn was becoming more and more frustrated. The whole off vibe she’d been getting since she stepped into this forest never let up and yet there was no sign of anything out of the ordinary. She paused and tilted her head. “Giles, listen. You hear that?”
“Hear what?”
“That’s just it. No sound at all. No birds, no buzz-buzz from insects, no rustling-y noises from animals. Just the two of us whispering and you crashing into trees.”
Giles turned towards her, his glasses an eerie glow in the uncertain moonlit glow. “You’re right. It’s downright eerie.”
“Spookification factor ten. There’s Hellmouth in dese here woods. So how do we get a bead on it?” Dawn spun in various directions. She couldn’t lock down the sensation of wrongness and felt like yelling for the big bad to come out and fight like a man, demon, whatever.
Giles panted, his breathing erratic, as tension shot through his chest. “Dawn, please. Maybe we should stop for a bit?”
“What? Why?”
“I-I don’t think we should go any farther.”
“What? No way! This thing’s close; I can feel it. Giles, don’t wimp out on me now.” Then she sensed it too. The palpable feeling of danger mingled with fear grew stronger. The air was so thick with it she could practically taste it on her tongue.
There were monsters in these woods: vampires, demons, supernatural beasties of every kind, all crowding in on her and her frail brother-in-law, waiting to pounce in numbers too great for them to fight. Doc was among them, his hands reaching for her, ready to cut into her and bleed her dry. She gave a gurgled whimper and plunged through the trees.
“Dawn!” Giles tore after her, following her more by sight than sound, as she pelted through the scrubby undergrowth. In spite of her head start, his longer legs enabled him to catch up to her at last. He tackled the girl and sent them both crashing to the ground, her sword flying from her grip into a nearby bush. Giles grabbed her arms but found pinning her down nearly impossible as she struggled wildly in his grasp.
“Dawn! Dawn, snap out of it! It isn’t real!” The tension he’d felt increased and took on solid form. Then he froze, his heart clenching in his chest.
Angelus was here. The soulless monster that had strapped him to a chair and tortured him for hours was lurking in the trees, smirking in hateful amusement, as the Englishman lay helpless on the forest floor. In seconds the urge to panic, to lurch up and go stumbling blindly through the trees took hold of him.
A loud whimper from the girl pinned under his larger form brought Giles back to the reality of their situation. If he ran now, he would lose Dawn. They would be separated and whatever was truly watching them in these woods would pick them off like helpless prey.
The ex-Watcher summoned all his mental forces. Gritting his teeth, he counted slowly to 10 then 20. Then 30. He slowed his breathing, and began counting backward. As he neared zero, the fear pounding at the edges of his awareness slowly abated.
He managed to focus on the brunette girl shivering underneath him. Her struggles had abated to be replaced by wild crying as she lay quivering on the ground. “Dawn? Dawn, listen to me. There’s nothing here.”
“He’s here. He’s after me. He’s going to kill me, I just know it,” she sobbed.
“He’s not here, whoever he is. Nothing’s here. Well, maybe something. We’re hunting a demon, after all. And that demon is trying to intimidate us.” He glared around him as if daring the thing to show itself.
“But I felt... I mean, I was sure--” God, her heart was pounding like a trip hammer and she gulped for breath, too winded to continue.
“I know. I felt it too. But it’ll take more than a false alarm to defeat us. Your sister’s a Slayer, remember? She taught you better than this.” Suddenly aware that he might be crushing the girl, he eased himself off her.
Dawn sat up, rubbing at her eyes. The thought that a demonic creature might have been using one of her deepest nightmares to terrify her into running like a scared sissy roused such irritation it was almost enough to banish the dread. Almost. When she was certain she could speak without panting, she murmured, “A-are you sure?”
“Undoubtedly. I experienced a similar reaction myself. But I told myself the perceived--threat couldn’t possibly be here. And I knew I was right. You must tell yourself that with the same conviction.”
Dawn hugged him. “Thanks, Giles. I-I’m glad you’re here with me. I wouldn’t have wanted Anya to see that.”
He smiled at her gratitude. “Don’t mention it. I believe we’ve got the Green Lady on the run.”
“How do you figure? We were the ones running like big babies.”
“I know so because she’s trying to scare us off. The magic around this place managed to keep us from pinning her down. But we’re in the general area so she knows it’s only a matter of time before we find her and pummel her senseless. She’s far more scared of us than we are of her.”
“Giles, you’re thinking about schoolyard bullies. That reasoning never works with them.”
“Is it working with you?”
She sniffled one more time. “Yeah. You got me there.”
Giles stood up, brushing the dirt from his knees, and took her hand. He couldn’t quite tell in the near dark. But he was sure there was a newfound grim determination in the younger Summers girl. These women didn’t take kindly to being toyed with. Ms. Icqueen had better watch out when Dawn Summers caught up to her.
Wielding his sword with a new confidence, the two resumed their search through the trees.
__________
“Watch it, Xander!” Anya hissed as Xander tripped for the umpteenth time.
“Hey, it’s dark in here, you know,” he hissed back, barely managing not to stumble on a tree root again.
“Maybe we should have left this to Dawn and Giles,” Anya groused.
“No way. This place is way too big for them to cover alone and we said we would help,” Willow countered.
Anya was quick to contradict that. “You said you would help. Xander and I wanted to head back home and make with the orgasms. As always, we get roped into Scooby business whether we like it or not. Thanks again for that, Willow. That was sarcasm, by the way,” she added.
“What’s the matter, Anya? Upset because Xander is holding off on the boning?” the wiccan replied with acid sweetness.
Anya opened her mouth to retaliate when Xander spoke up again. “You know, I’m thinking that splitting up’s a good idea. We go in other directions, you know, fan out military style...”
“And get totally lost,” Willow pointed out. “While you’re with me, you’ve got my wiccan lights to lead us back to the car.”
“Those lights? Not such a good idea. Any predators can see us long before we see them. You might as well throw up a sign that says ‘Tasty human treats here. Come and get ‘em.’” The lack of sex with Xander had made Anya cranky and she wasn’t in the mood to be generous.
Willow wasn’t about to let criticism of her methods slide. She considered herself more than capable as a leader. After all, she had been chosen to head the group all the summer Buffy was dead. “Well, you could go off with Xander if you’re worried about the lights, Anya. Of course, if you do, it’s just you, the trees and any bears who decide to make you a Scooby snack.”
“Bears? There aren’t any bears in these woods,” Xander protested.
“Then maybe the odd hillbilly. You could find yourself in a Deliverance sitch. If you hear banjo music, run like the wind, Xander,” Willow teased. The line was spoiled when she got caught in a low, scrubby bush and she paused to disentangle herself, swearing under her breath.
“Well, Xander is very cute and I could understand if other men wanted his body. Really, I never saw why those guys went after the Ned Beatty character. He was the ugliest man of the lot, big and fat with flabby buttocks. Now, Jon Voigt was definitely far better looking...”
Tuning out Anya’s ramblings, Willow freed her sweater from the thorny bush as her foot slipped on something underneath it. She frowned, peering at the underside of her sneaker, praying that she hadn’t stepped in birdshit or the crud from a dead animal. She squinted under the bush. What she saw stopped her cold. “Guys.”
“No way. Burt Reynolds was much cuter. Plus he was all tall, dark, manly looking and totally butch,” Xander protested. “What do you think, Willow?”
“Why are you asking her? She’s gay now. Besides, Jon Voigt was really the cute one. Burt Reynolds was the muy macho idiot egging his friends on to take that stupid trip to prove their manliness. It always seemed as if he was in denial to me. Speaking of which, why are you talking about buff-looking guys? Is there something you should be telling me?” Anya demanded.
“Guys.”
The dark-haired Scooby sputtered. “What? I’m--no, I’m totally into girls! I’m Xander the Manly Man. You know that! Besides, what are you doing even watching that film? Isn’t it, like, the definitive guy film, oh Miss Man-Hater?”
“Why? Because of all the male-on-male bonding and homoerotic tension?” Anya asked.
“Guys!”
Xander noticed her at last. “What? What is it, Wills? Is it a happy, funny something?”
Willow pointed a shaky finger towards the bush. “I-I...” She gulped and whispered, “I think I found something.” She waved one of her lights lower and lit up the shriveled mass of flesh crumpled on the ground. “Oh no.”
“Gah! Is that, is that--oh my god, that’s a body. We have a body here.” Xander swallowed hard, manfully repressing the urge to yak.
Anya was much more blasé about the appearance of the tiny corpse. “Hmmm. Looks like his skin’s been torn off. Did you do it?” she asked Willow.
The redhead glared at her. “Stop pinning every skinned body you see on me, Anya. It’s far more of the likely you would have done it.”
“Me? I’m not a demon any more, missy. But you’re still the one with the supernatural powers. How do we know you haven’t been killing babies?” Anya demanded.
“Anya, you’re not being fair,” Xander said. “Don’t forget, we’re tracking a scary lady in a green suit and it isn’t Poison Ivy.”
“Oh, please! Like you weren’t thinking it!” Anya replied, as always annoyed by human denial.
Willow’s lips thinned. “Well, since you turned your ex into something that ate human kids back before you opted for demonhood, I’m thinking this is more up your street.”
“Olaf ate babies whole. He didn’t flay them. Anyway, he’s tucked into another dimension unless you botched that spell and he got out.”
“All I’m saying is you weren’t too careful when you cast vengeance spells, were you? Didn’t you set a man on fire and have him burn down a whole village once? I remember you mentioning something like that.”
Willow tapped her chin as she pretended to recall the conversation. “Unless villages back in your day were made up mainly of skanky men and the hos they bumped hips with, I’m thinking a village would have had other people in it: children, babies, women, old people. All those people burnt alive just ‘cause you fried one guy who was careless with his ding dong. That was your doing, Anyanka.”
“I was young, all right?” Anya yelled, the need for discretion and quiet completely forgotten. “Granting wishes isn’t a precise science and, besides, the main object is to cause as much suffering, destruction and damage as possible among worthless humans. Lest we forget, who was it who went crazy, skinned a man alive and tried to destroy the world last year?”
“Who became Evil Demon Girl after her man cheated on her and caused 1,100 years of random mayhem and murder?” Willow replied.
“At least I didn’t lose my mind and attack my friends! I can understand your going after Buffy and Dawn. Buffy was almost useless last year, wallowing in self-pity because she was alive again, and Dawn was being a total brat and thief. But why go after Xander and me? What did we ever do to you?”
Willow was totally shocked. “What? You’re saying it was okay for me to attack Dawn?”
“Well, she was a thief. Thieves deserve to be punished.”
“And you’re the murderous demon--”
“Ex-demon!”
“Who throws her humanity on the rubbish pile every time some man done her wrong! Lousy coping skills much, Anya?” Willow snarled.
Now both women were getting into it. Xander felt as if their freaky emotions were spiraling out of control like a roller coaster ride gone amok. “Ladies, hey, let’s all calm down here.”
Reminded of Xander’s presence, Anya rounded on him. “Oh, look who’s trying to be the mature one: the guy who left me crying at the altar. Talk about lousy coping skills--let’s take a look at your commitment issues, Alexander Lavelle Harris.”
“My commitment issues? Who was the one who went flying to the slimy undead for a little hip grindage?” Xander sneered.
“So what? Buffy did it with Spike a lot more often than I did. I’m betting you’re not getting on her case!” Anya snapped. Why did Buffy always get a free pass with Xander? Did he still care for her? Maybe that was the real reason Xander dumped her--he was still carrying a torch for his skinny, dried-up blonde Slayer.
“Buffy only hurt herself. You hurt me just like you’ve hurt every man who ever crossed your gun sights.” Xander glanced from the body to the ex-vengeance demon. “Maybe something you did or somebody you cursed is responsible for this. Let’s not forget Ronny the ‘embellished’ worm or that humongous spider you summoned and left to go organ munching all around Sunnydale until Buffy killed it!”
“Way to make with the stealth, guys. Giles and I could hear you from miles away.” That wasn’t strictly true. But the silence among the trees had been so oppressive that Dawn had picked up her friends’ voices easily once they got within range of the arguing trio.
The three other Scoobies immediately started talking at once, accusations, recriminations and long-buried resentments tumbling over each other until Dawn yelled again to regain the silence. “Guys! What’s with you all?”
“Willow flayed a baby,” Anya said before anybody else could speak.
“Anya, you must be mistaken--” Giles began.
“I did not! Stop blaming every bad thing that happens on me! Xander could have done it, too, you know. Remember that singing, dancing demon he summoned? It fried six people and nearly took Dawn to hell to be its live-in girl toy and the manly man here had the nerve to blame it on witches!”
Again Giles tried to interrupt. “Willow, please. You’re being unfair. There’s a malevolent influence at work here, one we must muster our faculties to combat.”
Ignoring him, Xander interrupted. “Hey, why are you picking on me, Willow? I’m on your side.”
“Oh, please, Xander. You used me to send Buffy after Angelus ‘cause you wanted him dead so much. But when Anyanka kills 18 frat boys, you try to hold her off and it’s Xander to the rescue.”
Willow was taking potshots at Anya? Xander thought it was time to point out a few things. “I was trying to help. You know, like what I did when you were on your world-ending rampage! You nearly killed Giles, Buffy, Dawn and me and did you ever say you were sorry for any of it?”
“You ever say you were sorry for trying to kill me and rape Buffy when you were Hyena Xander?” Willow shot back.
There was a brief, stunned silence at this statement, enough for Dawn to step into the breech. “HEY!” She stared at them as they turned towards her.
Dawn shivered. There it was again, the evil, ugly feeling curdling in the air, somehow transforming itself into rage. Her friends were clutching their weapons and Willow’s hands were shaking minutely. It was tough to tell, given the darkness, but Dawn wouldn’t have been the least bit surprised if the wiccan’s eyes were turning black. “Guys, we cannot do this. There’s something in these woods, something way evil…”
“Gee, wonder who that could be?” Anya sniped, directing a pointed glance at the redhead.
Giles pinned the ex-vengeance demon down with a steely-eyed stare. “Anya, don’t be so bloody dense. It’s not like you. None of this is like us. Do you recall the incident with Gachnar the fear demon?”
“The Mini Me of the demon world? You think he’s behind this? Buffy totally defeated him. We all saw it,” Xander replied.
Willow remembered the tiny demon, too. “Yeah, Dawn. You weren’t there for that but Buffy squished him. She squished him good.”
“However, that was after she foolishly brought it into our world,” Anya added.
“She stopped it, didn’t she?” Giles answered tartly.
“By stomping on it. That’s something any of us could have done.” Anya often thought Buffy’s prowess as a Slayer was overrated. After all, as Anyanka she’d clearly fought her to a standstill before D’Hoffryn had intervened.
“Yeah. But she’s the one who did it, wasn’t she?” Dawn snapped. “Anyway I’m betting old Gack’s not the only demon out there able to put the emotional whammy on people. I’m thinking all the off-the-page rage is about getting us away from whatever’s going after these kids.”
“My emotions were definitely valid. There are issues that need to be addressed here,” Anya answered. “I think I have legitimate beefs against certain parties present for lack of commitment, thievery and world destruction agendas.”
“Whatever. But your emotions were all veering off the scale. I’m sure ‘cause Giles and me were feeling it, too.”
“You were wanting to go all axe murder-y on each other?” Willow ventured.
“Uh, not exactly. We got slammed with fear. But we dealt with it.” Dawn wasn’t exactly ashamed of admitting to fear. But Doc had been a part of her terror fantasy just now and she still wasn’t ready to get into it.
“So that’s it then. We’re definitely dealing with something capable of dishing out the hocus pocus not some human serial killer,” Xander stated.
“Speaking of which…” Willow pointed to her discovery under the thorny bush.
Dawn crouched on the ground to stare at the shrunken body. “Oh god. Poor Rosalind,” she whispered. Giles crouched beside her, draping one solid arm around her shoulders. The sight had to be upsetting, all the more so given her sister’s pregnancy.
“A-are we sure that’s Rosalind? I mean, we can’t really make out the face because of, you know, lack of face. It could be any one of the others,” Xander gulped, his voice trailing off.
“I don’t believe so, Xander,” Anya replied in her usual critical fashion. “The other bodies would be days and weeks old. This one looks too fresh and there are no animal marks on it. I’m thinking hungry creatures would have been making swift inroads into the flesh and there would be other signs of decay. A rotten odor, for instance.”
Dawn stood up, the crouching making her knees ache. “But I’m thinking animals wouldn’t be so much of the possible here. We haven’t heard any since we came into this place. Right, Giles?”
“No animals?” Xander lifted his head, noting the eldritch stillness for the first time. “Riiight. No flying things, slithering things, creepy-crawlies or things that go bump in the night.”
“Except you, Xander.”
“That’s what I’ve always loved about you, An. You’ve always been so supportive,” Xander shot back, the irony unmistakable.
Irony was apparently lost on one ex-vengeance demon. “Really? Because I think everybody could use a little self improvement.”
“That was sarcasm, Anya,” Willow chimed in sweetly.
“People, could we please focus on the dead body?” Dawn asked wearily. “Guys, we need to get out of here, call 911 and let them know about--this.”
“Who should call them? We don’t want any of our voices getting on tape. The police might be able to track us down,” Anya said with a frown.
“Calling the police--not really of the good. If they enter these woods, they’ll feel the same things we felt. They won’t be able to get anywhere near the kid’s body. They might even go all serial killer and kill each other,” Willow pointed out.
“Will’s right. It looks like it’s the Scooby gang to the rescue again. So how about we find the bad scary thing that did this first? I’m thinking I don’t want this skin-ripper loose in Sunnydale one more night. Sound like a plan?” Xander asked, his anxious gaze scanning the trees.
Ever quick to carp, Anya pointed out the basic flaw in his thinking. “But we still haven’t found her, Xander. I’m betting this creature is smart enough to have chucked this baby far away from her hiding place. She could be on the other side of the forest for all we know.”
Struck by an idea, Dawn remembered the extra burden in her backpack and fumbled for the straps. As she lifted out her camera, Willow frowned. “Dawn, why did you bring that?”
“Um, ever since I found out I’ve got the knack for photo snappage, I’ve been sorta carrying it everywhere. You never know when you might get a photo op and since we can’t take the, the…baby with us, I thought maybe I could take pictures. When I get them developed, we could look them over. Maybe we could get some clues.” Okay, that sounded a little morbid but the others didn’t have to stare at me as if my skin had turned blue.
Giles’s voice was soothing. “That’s a wonderful suggestion, Dawn. Perhaps we should take these kinds of records more often for the future.”
Dawn smiled gratefully at him. That’s what she loved about Giles; even when he was playing the grownup, he always tried to support you. She lifted the camera and began taking rapid pictures of the body.
“What about the baby? Her parents--they’ll want her for burial.” Giles was loath to abandon the tiny helpless corpse. A strong impulse to protect the child wouldn’t let her leave although the poor thing was past saving.
“I’ll transport it to the police station. I don’t think anybody else will bother it and, if they’ve been on the lookout for a baby killer, well, then they’ll be the ones to ring up the kid’s parents,” Willow replied, waving her hands in the air. She hated the idea of sending the child away like this. It was horrible to look at but dumping this kind of problem in somebody else’s lap felt wrong. This was Hellmouth business and therefore Slayer business and therefore it should be left in the hands of the Scoobies. But they couldn’t leave the kid here and they couldn’t take it with them. Life on the Hellmouth really sucked sometimes.
“What do we do now?” Xander asked. “I’m thinking our little search-and-destroy mission just got benched for tonight, didn’t it?”
The wiccan muttered a brief incantation. There was a slight but audible pop as the baby winked out of sight. Then a light wind eddied around the area, neatly covering their tracks. “‘Fraid so, Xand. The only thing I can think of would be to lay a kind of magical compulsion on the spot to draw the beastie to us and, without knowing exactly what it is, we could wind up bringing all sorts of demons here.”
“Yes, and I’ve had enough of Xander being a demon magnet, Willow.” Willow sent another poisonous glare in Anya’s direction. Xander could see another argument looming on the horizon and wanted to tell them both to stop it. But he settled for pulling Anya by the arm, muttering that it might be a good idea to scram before whatever was lurking in these woods decided to eat them.
__________
Buffy paced up and down, scowled at the clock, and then paced some more. She’d been cooped up in her new home for the last three hours and it was driving her crazy. She’d done some light housework to work off some excess energy and then settled in to wait for the others to return.
It was too quiet without the Scooby gang. She hadn’t felt this lonely since that summer she’d taken off to disappear in L.A. She hadn’t realized how bad it was not to have her friends around her, always within reach should she want to talk or slay.
For the first time she realized how much she and the others had drifted apart. Oh, they were still friends and would always be Scoobies even years down the line. But Xander and Willow had new lives now, lives that didn’t center on her.
Willow had chosen to stay in Sunnydale to go to college. But it was a big world and she’d seen part of it when she went to England. When her guard was down, the redheaded wiccan would babble on and on about what great times she’d had over there with the coven. Her impressive magical abilities had allowed her to pull a flower through the earth all the way from across the ocean. With powers like that, there was no limit to where Willow could go.
She also blushed whenever she talked about that blonde English girl she’d met at Buffy’s wedding. The woman had gone back to her home country but sensitive Slayer hearing had caught the name “Monique” when Willow talked sometimes on her cell phone. Something told Buffy that one way or the other Willow might leave her in the very near future.
Willow was her best girlfriend. Buffy had lost touch with her old girlfriends from Hemery and they had been a shallow bunch anyway, willfully uncaring that people were disappearing. They had been as blind as the folks on the Hellmouth and Buffy had been no better; she’d admitted as much to Angel once.
Her awakening to her Slayer status had started the certain rift between her and her friends. After that, it was impossible to go back. Until Willow came along, there had been no replacement for them. Now it looked like Buffy might lose her as well.
Xander and Anya were slowly but surely patching things up. They were having sex again, although not as often as the ex-demon would like, and Anya was dropping broad hints that they might be looking for a house in a Hellmouth-free environment soon. It was best to have children away from Demon Central, she stated. It was all right for Buffy to stay; the Hellmouth needed a Slayer. But there was no need for Xander or a child to risk their lives here.
Anya was right; the Hellmouth was no place to bring up a family. Even without the latest rash of Sunnydale evil with disappearing children, what Anya said was no different than what Buffy had been thinking when she’d first learned of her pregnancy. It was just the first time it had been spoken out loud. So it looked like she’d have to let Xander go.
It had been a wakeup call to hear Anya speak that way and somehow Xander’s constant assurances that he wouldn’t leave Buffy as long as she needed him hadn’t taken away the worry. Xander was her anchor in a way the others weren’t. He was the solid human presence, the heart of the Scoobies, and Buffy couldn’t deny it would hurt to lose his smile, his easy laugh, his awful jokes, his sensitive way of getting right to the heart of a problem and offering comfort and solutions. It wouldn’t be the same without him and she felt a tear well up in her eyes at the thought of his absence.
Buffy sniffled and wiped her nose fiercely. Darn mood swings; if she started crying now, she’d never stop and she didn’t want to meet Giles with red eyes.
The baby kicked and she sucked in a swift breath at the sensation. She had thought she could lie down to while away the hours. But baby kicking made sleeping more and more problematic these days. She would shift around in bed in vain attempts to get comfortable so she could fall asleep. When Giles was there, he’d rub her back or massage her swollen feet and ankles to soothe her. That helped a lot. But now he wasn’t here and trying to sleep would be a lost cause.
She glanced at the clock again, willing the hours to fly by more quickly. Maybe she should call them just to check. No, they might be in the middle of a fight right now and they didn’t need the distraction. The thought that Giles might be fighting without her made Buffy’s heart clench and her hands tremble. God, she hated being helpless like this! “Maybe I should have called Angel’s people in. Nothing like a souled vampire for backup.”
The baby kicked again. “Ow. Quit it,” she scowled. “You’re not alone in there, you know.” He or she seemed to sense whenever Buffy was tense or unhappy; the kicking was especially fierce when her mood was troubled. So she did her best to think happy thoughts. She never managed to fool the little kid, though. Only genuine happiness produced calm waters, a Giles phrase, and she grinned when she thought of his unexpected humor. That must have done the trick because the kicking stopped.
Another look at the clock and she made up her mind. “Screw it,” Buffy muttered. “I don’t care if they’re planting bombs. I’m calling.”
She picked her cell phone out of a drawer and prepared to call Giles’s number. A sudden pressure in her lower extremities woke up and started calling for her attention. “Nuts. Now I remember why I can’t go out fighting.”
Her constant, unexpected cravings and the frequent trips to the bathroom entailed by her appetite meant she was racing to relieve her bladder almost every hour. You could set your clock to Buffy’s bathroom sprints. It was embarrassing. There was no way she could help the others with that kind of problem. Buffy set down the cell and waddled, grumbling, to the bathroom. It looked like she was stuck with waiting on Giles and the others.
Immediate tinkling taken care of, her tummy rumbled again. It wasn’t the baby this time; it was a sudden craving making itself felt. “I want, I want…what the hell do I want?” Buffy mused while slowly rubbing her stomach.
“Cookie Dough Fudge Mint Chip!” That was a favorite ice cream flavor of hers although she couldn’t have said why. She should have preferred a flavor with peanut butter in it but somehow Cookie Dough remained a favorite. A mad dash to the refrigerator, however, revealed no creamy icy goodness.
“Great. Dawn probably ate it all the last time she was here,” she groused as she stared into the ice cream-less freezer. “When she gets back, we are so going to have a serious talk about respecting a pregnant woman’s diet needs.”
Now what was she going to do? Cookie Dough Fudge Mint Chip was a specialty item and none of the nearby stores stocked it. She’d have to wander farther afield.
Buffy looked outside. “Okay, so it’s a little dark. Kinda. I’ll be out 15, 20 minutes, tops. What’s the worst that could happen? It’s not like I’m Dawn.”
Buffy shuffled around in the front seat of the car while struggling to fasten the seatbelt. Even pushing the car seat all the way back to allow for her oversized belly didn’t entirely relieve the awkwardness of driving. Giles hated to have her drive in her condition and had insisted on chaperoning her everywhere she went lately, something she pretended to hate although his chivalric concern touched her as always.
Well, Giles had been against her driving even before she got pregnant so that wasn’t really new. But Buffy thought her motoring skills had really improved and insisted on driving herself when he wasn’t around. Her husband would cringe and mutter under his breath but he did his best to smother his concerns in order not to offend her.
Seatbelt fastened, Buffy checked the rearview mirror and pulled out of her driveway. “Cookie Dough, here I come.”
__________
Giles sighed as he trudged into his home. The night had ended with defeat and telling Buffy about the tiny corpse they found would undoubtedly depress her. He leaned against the door as he shut it and closed his eyes wearily, anxious to stave off the coming confrontation.
The next moment he straightened and peered down his hallway. Where was Buffy? Why hadn’t she come to meet him? “Buffy? Dearest? Where are you?”
Quiet. The house was too quiet and the stillness was too much like that of the forest he’d just left. He started walking then running through his house, rushing from one room to another. “Buffy! Where are you? Answer me!”
Halting before his bedroom, he grasped the knob with trembling fingers. The faded false terror from earlier in the evening returned in full force as the image of Jenny’s corpse propped in his bed flashed before his eyes. He flung open the door and stared at the bed.
It was empty. The sheets were pristine and untouched and somehow this terrified him even more. Buffy hadn’t slept since he left her and he knew how her altered weight made her toss on the bed in order to get comfortable.
But if she wasn’t here then where was she?

TBC
- 8
- 9
- 10
You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.
Report Story

What a Mother Wouldn't Do