FM February Topic - How do you win a war?
It would figure I'd come back just in time to fight the next war. Guess all that time spent living on the Hellmouth, before I even knew what is was, left me with a knack for these kinds of things. And here I thought I'd come to town, so some catch up time with my best friend on the beach, maybe reconnect with the ex-girlfriend I still loved, touch base with everyone I'd lost touch with completely while I'd been out there in the world playing hide-and-seek with myself.
But nope. I come to town, and it's war. Which, at first I was a little less than phased by. We'd won so many of these. Only all of them. There was a certain method to it now. Figure out what we're up against, let them take the first hit, then go back in for the kill and end it once and for all. They'd already figured out what they were up against though. And that first hit? Had only been one of many. I didn't realize how much I missed until I arrived at that Slayer school of Kennedy and Faith's and the stories started pouring. Some of them I figured might be a little on the exaggerated side. Rumors even. Some of them shed new lights on Kennedy I kinda would have rather not seen her in.
Above all was the enemy we were up against. Senior Partners. I'd never really had the pleasure of having to research them for any of our previous missions or battles, but I vaguely remembered references of them that I'd come across. Under the, 'things that can't be killed' sections in most books. It was a misleading statement. Just because something couldn't be killed, didn't mean it couldn't be contained. I just didn't remember how this particular kind of uber powerful demon could.
So thankfully Faith's sister was a witch too. Faith had a sister. Who knew? Apparently everyone who'd actually been around in the last year or so.
That left me out on the battlefield, so to speak, holding the line between Connor and this guy Alec's teams. I wasn't sure what exactly that meant or what it was gonna entail, I just knew that Buffy was going to be on the inside, and Xander was as MIA as I'd been all this time which meant no one here really knew to watch out for me to sprout skank roots with the black corneas. Except for one person.
“Hey, Dawnie,” I said, approaching her in the midst of all the people branching off on to either Team One or Team Two. “Can you...you know, keep an eye on me?” I asked quietly. “Just make sure if I start to go all Dark Willow, someone cuts off my source.” She agreed and I wasn't expecting her not to. It just felt kind of weird, putting it off on her. Usually she was the protected one. Wasn't used to asking her to protect me. But asking someone to guard against Dark Willow was actually protecting everyone, so it evened out, I guess.
I listened as Connor addressed the girls, nodding intently when he mentioned that they should all sorta stay out of the way of my magical path. And not to pay much attention to the big light show either. 'Cause that really could be distracting. And distraction more often than not leads to dead Slayers.
It was all so, end of days, Sunnydale. Only this time, there were...way more demons. And was that a dragon? Yep. Definitely a dragon. Among all of the other really big demons. I never thought I'd live to see anything worse than a seemingly endless supply of Turok-Han. I was wrong.
I had just finished forming my circle, the line that would keep everything else from getting to me so I could keep getting to everything else, when the sky broke wide open and a portal unlike any other I'd ever seen began to form, only growing wider and wider as we all took it in. Some girls were shocked, some were scared. I suddenly wished there was some kind of mass Slayer booster spell I could do. Like last time, when I could at least activate them all before watching them head off to a battle no one could be ready for. This time, there was nothing I could. Just stand inside my circle and try my best to close the portal like Connor asked me to. Closing my eyes against the monster parade that came at us, I began to recite the best spell I knew. No bothering with the small stuff. Big guns only. People around me were already starting to die. I could feel it, the shifting of the energy and the balances of power. For my part, I managed to make the portal a little smaller. Not much, but enough that when I opened my eyes, I could see some of the bigger demons struggling to make their way through.
I needed help. I needed more strength, more energy. And no one on either side of me could afford to spare it for me. Not like the time I took from Kennedy and Anya. And that was only one portal, and one demon. So I did the unthinkable. I started stealing the energy of the demons, especially the bigger ones. It helped, in defeating them. And it also helped me keep my hold on what amount of portal shrinking I'd accomplished. Dangerous though in that, borrowing the essence of something evil made me a million more times likely to go dark myself, which was already a threat with the level of magick this was requiring.
Regardless, I kept doing. Pointing my arms in the direction of the biggest, most baddest looking thing I could find and stealing its life force. All of it, too. Not just enough to get by. Enough to kill completely. And hey, if I...if I lose myself again, and it's me who becomes the monster they need to fight, it won't be so bad. One way or another, we're winning this thing.
How do I know?
Easy.
The way to win any war is simply to be on Buffy's side. Or in this case, Faith's.
But nope. I come to town, and it's war. Which, at first I was a little less than phased by. We'd won so many of these. Only all of them. There was a certain method to it now. Figure out what we're up against, let them take the first hit, then go back in for the kill and end it once and for all. They'd already figured out what they were up against though. And that first hit? Had only been one of many. I didn't realize how much I missed until I arrived at that Slayer school of Kennedy and Faith's and the stories started pouring. Some of them I figured might be a little on the exaggerated side. Rumors even. Some of them shed new lights on Kennedy I kinda would have rather not seen her in.
Above all was the enemy we were up against. Senior Partners. I'd never really had the pleasure of having to research them for any of our previous missions or battles, but I vaguely remembered references of them that I'd come across. Under the, 'things that can't be killed' sections in most books. It was a misleading statement. Just because something couldn't be killed, didn't mean it couldn't be contained. I just didn't remember how this particular kind of uber powerful demon could.
So thankfully Faith's sister was a witch too. Faith had a sister. Who knew? Apparently everyone who'd actually been around in the last year or so.
That left me out on the battlefield, so to speak, holding the line between Connor and this guy Alec's teams. I wasn't sure what exactly that meant or what it was gonna entail, I just knew that Buffy was going to be on the inside, and Xander was as MIA as I'd been all this time which meant no one here really knew to watch out for me to sprout skank roots with the black corneas. Except for one person.
“Hey, Dawnie,” I said, approaching her in the midst of all the people branching off on to either Team One or Team Two. “Can you...you know, keep an eye on me?” I asked quietly. “Just make sure if I start to go all Dark Willow, someone cuts off my source.” She agreed and I wasn't expecting her not to. It just felt kind of weird, putting it off on her. Usually she was the protected one. Wasn't used to asking her to protect me. But asking someone to guard against Dark Willow was actually protecting everyone, so it evened out, I guess.
I listened as Connor addressed the girls, nodding intently when he mentioned that they should all sorta stay out of the way of my magical path. And not to pay much attention to the big light show either. 'Cause that really could be distracting. And distraction more often than not leads to dead Slayers.
It was all so, end of days, Sunnydale. Only this time, there were...way more demons. And was that a dragon? Yep. Definitely a dragon. Among all of the other really big demons. I never thought I'd live to see anything worse than a seemingly endless supply of Turok-Han. I was wrong.
I had just finished forming my circle, the line that would keep everything else from getting to me so I could keep getting to everything else, when the sky broke wide open and a portal unlike any other I'd ever seen began to form, only growing wider and wider as we all took it in. Some girls were shocked, some were scared. I suddenly wished there was some kind of mass Slayer booster spell I could do. Like last time, when I could at least activate them all before watching them head off to a battle no one could be ready for. This time, there was nothing I could. Just stand inside my circle and try my best to close the portal like Connor asked me to. Closing my eyes against the monster parade that came at us, I began to recite the best spell I knew. No bothering with the small stuff. Big guns only. People around me were already starting to die. I could feel it, the shifting of the energy and the balances of power. For my part, I managed to make the portal a little smaller. Not much, but enough that when I opened my eyes, I could see some of the bigger demons struggling to make their way through.
I needed help. I needed more strength, more energy. And no one on either side of me could afford to spare it for me. Not like the time I took from Kennedy and Anya. And that was only one portal, and one demon. So I did the unthinkable. I started stealing the energy of the demons, especially the bigger ones. It helped, in defeating them. And it also helped me keep my hold on what amount of portal shrinking I'd accomplished. Dangerous though in that, borrowing the essence of something evil made me a million more times likely to go dark myself, which was already a threat with the level of magick this was requiring.
Regardless, I kept doing. Pointing my arms in the direction of the biggest, most baddest looking thing I could find and stealing its life force. All of it, too. Not just enough to get by. Enough to kill completely. And hey, if I...if I lose myself again, and it's me who becomes the monster they need to fight, it won't be so bad. One way or another, we're winning this thing.
How do I know?
Easy.
The way to win any war is simply to be on Buffy's side. Or in this case, Faith's.