Buffybot in Tabula Rasa
PAIRING: None
RATING: PG-13
FEEDBACK: Very welcome, to keswindhover@yahoo.co.uk
BETA: Miss Murchison - thanks!
SETTING: This fic is set during the events of 'Tabula Rasa' in BtVS Series 6, when the Scoobies temporarily lose their memories. I've twiddled with the time sequence in the episode a tiny bit, but just call it artistic licence.
DISCLAIMER: The characters belong to Joss. I’m borrowing, and I promise to put them all back in reasonably good condition, and only slightly used.
NOTE: This story is a sequel to Buffybot Behind Bars!, but it can perfectly well be read as a stand-alone.
SCENE: A house in Sunnydale
Chapter Seven
The door to the cellar crashed open, and Joan leapt into the room, closely followed by Randy, each with two stakes at the ready. Rupert and Anya peered round the door behind them, ready to run if necessary.
“Hi guys!” said Buffybot. “You’re back!”
Joan and Randy looked at each other, and groaned, in unison. It was that lunatic again. They relaxed out of their fighting pose, and put up their stakes, unconsciously mirroring each other as they did so.
Joan folded her arms, and tapped one stake impatiently on her sleeve. Not a vampire in sight. “Just what are you doing in here?”
“We’re going to the hospital to hunt for Clues!” said Buffybot, bouncing on her toes. This was ever so exciting! Everyone in one place, ready for the Hunt!
“We?” said Rupert. He and Anya had slipped into the room, and were now standing hand in hand staring doubtfully at the hole in the middle of the floor.
Buffybot turned to the open trap behind her. “Me and my intrepid band,” she said proudly, gesturing downwards.
Rupert, Anya, Joan and Randy all moved closer to the trap. Four fearful and curious pairs of eyes peered over the edge - to be met by four fearful and curious pairs of eyes looking back up at them.
“Dawn!” cried Joan.
“Joan!” cried Dawn. “At least, is that you, or is it Lara?”
Joan blinked. “It’s me,” she said. “Joan, your big sister, remember?”
“Well, obviously I remember,” said Dawn a little testily, “I just wasn’t sure if it was you or Lara, that’s all. You’re kinda hard to tell apart.”
“Except my hair is naturally curly, and naturally blonde!” said Buffybot.
Joan threw the Bot a dirty look. Why did everyone keep saying she looked like this dork? Just look at her. Obviously completely simple, and with totally lame hair!
Rupert, meanwhile, had fetched the ladder stored at the back of the cellar, and fed it down the hole. One by one Dawn, Willow, Tara and Alex emerged - filthy, sweat stained and exhausted.
Anya, who had been admiring Rupert's backside as he leaned over the open trap, turned to regard the bedraggled foursome with a certain amount of satisfaction. Ha! Eveyone had thought she was stupid, making Rupey stay behind with her in the shop - but look at the state of everyone who’d gone off questing, and vampire hunting.
“Weren’t you able to get through?” asked Randy. “The vampires are out in force up in the streets.”
“And they've got a bazooka," said Joan. "Randy was going to charge it - but even a noble vampire couldn't survive a direct hit from one of those things."
"Randy's a vampire?!" cried the frightened foursome, huddling together again.
"A noble vampire, with a soul," said Randy rather wearily, holding his hands out to show just how harmless he was. Sadly, the stakes he held in each hand undermined the effect a bit, and they all flinched.
"It is kinda lame," said Joan, misinterpreting the expressions on her new friends' faces. "But that's the way it is. He's noble, and he's chatty."
Randy sent her a rather resentful look. He was not chatty, he was eloquent! Joan seemed a bit insensitive, frankly. Even though she was darned attractive.
“Only one vampire downstairs," said Alex, brushing at the grease and dirt stains on his pants. “And Lara got him. And she said she knew the way to the hospital. So we followed her. Right back here, as it turns out.” He looked at the Buffybot quizzically, handing back her sword as he did so.
“That’s right!” Buffybot nodded at Alex excitedly. “The hospital is down in Southside. Thattaway, about five miles after the sewers end!” She pointed confidently at the south wall of the cellar.
There was a long silence while everyone thought that through.
“The hospital is beyond the range of the sewer complex,” said Willow slowly. She ran her hand through her hair and sighed, thinking of the hours of gut churning terror they had just spent down in those tunnels.
“Oh goodness me, yes!” said Buffybot. She looked around her, bright eyed. “It would be quickest if we took Mr Giles’ car,” she said. “But if that isn’t allowed in the Game we can walk it, easy. I've patched up my leg really well!” She tapped her thigh, satisfied with a job well done.
“Is it red?” said Randy.
Buffybot turned to him, puzzled.
“The car, is it red?”
“Ooh yes!” said Buffybot. “It’s red, and sporty, and it has a great big engine- vroom, vroom!” She pumped an imaginary accelerator with her splendid patched up leg, grinning.
“Thought so!” said Randy, smirking at Rupert.
Rupert coughed and adjusted his collar self-consciously. “I suppose, conceivably, we could all pack into my car, somehow. If we could find it, of course.” He spoke without any enthusiasm. The idea of his car - which sounded like it was perfectly lovely - becoming the target of a bazooka wielding demon did not appeal to him.
There was a depressed silence. Thing really didn’t seem to be going at all well.
Buffybot looked at her companions, puzzled. No one seemed to be enjoying the Game much - and yet she was having a wonderful time!
“Perhaps we should look for my car, at that,” said Rupert gloomily.
“Hang on a minute,” said Joan. She moved across the room and looked hard at Buffybot. “How does she know what color your car is, or that you’ve got a car at all?”
“Hmm ... that’s a very good question,” said Rupert, looking at Joan approvingly. He turned to Buffybot, eyebrow raised.
“And another thing ...” started Willow.
“..we couldn’t help noticing,” added Tara.
Willow's finger pointed at Buffybot's grubby toes, “ ...why does she have two right feet?" The eyes of the assembled throng followed her dramatically pointing finger. There was a collective gasp from all but Rupert and Anya.
"Rupey and I already noticed the feet," said Anya, “ages ago. We thought it was kinda odd, too."
"Odd!" shouted Dawn. "She's got two right feet! That’s more than bit odd!" She shuddered, and eyed Buffybot with distaste. It was just so unfair that she had been saddled with a mad, deformed elder sister, as well as a bossy one. "She could be like a Bride of Frankenstein or something!"
Everyone looked at Buffybot, and her sword, with renewed alarm. She beamed back at them.
"Lara," said Tara carefully. "No one's accusing you of anything here. Or suggesting that you are in any way a Bride of Frankenstein," she added, frowning at Dawn. "But we are all ... puzzled by why you have two right feet. Now, I'm sure there's a perfectly reasonable explanation ..."
"Yes, there is," said Buffybot cheerfully. Her logic circuits were beginning to race, as she processed the conversation so far.
"Really?" said Tara, startled.
"Yes!" said Buffybot. "My left leg got run over by a motorbike, and Jonathan only had a spare right leg."
Rupert heard Anya give an exasperated sigh. He nodded to himself. It was exactly this kind of comment that had given him a headache the last time he’d talked to this girl.
"Would that be Jonathan Frankenstein?" muttered Dawn, with a little sidelong look at Tara.
Buffybot sent her a dazzling smile. "No, it's Jonathan Levinson. He re-built me!"
Rupert looked around at the boggled expressions on the faces around him. Well, at least he wasn’t the only ... oh, wait! "Oh, oh, dear Lord!" he cried. "Wrenches, spare parts, re-building - you're ..."
"You're the Bionic Woman!" gasped Alex.
“You’re a robot!” gasped Rupert at the same time, and then threw Alex an irritated glance. Was the boy an idiot?
"Yes I am!" said Buffybot.
There was a collective ooh! as everyone stared at Buffybot’s two grubby right feet. She wiggled her toes a little self consciously. It was amazing how interested everyone was in them!
There was a confused babble of voices as everyone began to talk at once, and to gesticulate wildly, and re-run the various strange conversations that taken place recently in their minds. Buffybot stood patiently, her mind was racing. Could it be everyone really had lost their memories? It wasn't part of the Game? Her eyes got big - ooh! That explained all sorts of things!
“What are you for?” asked Anya, cutting to the chase.
“I fight and I slay!" said Buffybot proudly, "and I make sandwiches and pancakes, and I wash up - and I download stuff, and I read lots and lots of books!” She turned to Tara with a big beaming grin. “Tara lends me her books; she has great books!” Tara smiled back at her, weakly. Apparently she was best friends with a lethal demon slaying Robo-girl. Well, that was no weirder than anything else that had happened today.
“And now..” Buffybot rustled in her jacket pocket, causing the crowd to jump back, “ ...now I’ve got my own library card!” she said triumphantly, brandishing a little plastic oblong in the air.
The Scoobies stared at her as she stood, flashing them a dazzling smile, sword in one hand, library card in the other. It was a weird, weird world they found themselves in.
Feedback is very welcome!
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