Hope climbs atop of the piano
Reaching out towards the warmth of the sun
Some man tries to ask her down, but now maybe that's where she belongs
My god she said "I'm the sunflower that wants"
My god, he said "this woman is gone"
Into the dark is there anybody there? My god, she said

Our Lady Peace "Hope"

(Little shivers and white noises---)

I'm Buffy- the Vampire Slayer- and you are?

Nobody messes with my boyfriend…

I live with that every day

We're not friends… never were

(She's weeping—)

I'm never gonna change… I want my life to be with you

Dawnie… what did you do? What DID you do?

Willow! Willow wanted me to tell you—

(LIES! All lies…)

You think you know—

No friends. Just the Kill. We are alone.

Do you love me?

It's not the demon that needs killing Buffy. It's the man…

(no…. NO! Stay with me… just stay with me- fight the monsters--)

-- what's to come… who you are?

Dream, darling… sleep darling

I'm just gonna go. Go. I'm just gonna--

- You haven't even begun

I fall, into blue. It looks like the ocean for a quick startling flash, and it's beautiful in it's crystalline coldness. My face burns with the heat of death and I feel my eyes being pushed back into my head. It's a quiet kill- my suicide- I don't scream as I dive like a bird with outstretched wings into the drowning deep. My voice remains silent.

I yearn to close my eyes. Things must be over. Everything goes black as his eyes and I see a raven arc across my vision, it's night soaked orbs seeking me out with bloody intent. I do scream then. I scream all the way into nothing.

Nothing—

~~~

Soft rain spills across my face as I open my eyes. I'm lying on a street corner, in a gutter swollen with water. Touching my cheek gingerly, I graze the flesh with hesitant fingers.

Where am I?

It's a stupid question. I must be in Sunnydale. I must be home. But I can't remember. I can't remember how I came to be on this road. Did I fall during a bad fight? Is the demon waiting to finish me off—see the look of peace upon my face when it drinks my blood? Springing to my feet, I groan as the bones in my legs and arms creak with a sorrowful agony.

Sighing, I glance around and feel my ears roaring louder and louder as I do.

Sunnydale is a shell.

Burnt out and blackened, it's crumpled edges begging to come back into view. Tears blur my eyes as I whirl round and round, trying to see what happened, trying to see who did this. Stumbling as I walk, I rub my neck with shaking hands, wondering if this happened while I was asleep. I see no bodies. But everyone must have died. No one could survive a devastation of this magnitude—

-- the acrid smell of ashes and smoke reacches my nose and I feel the light splattering of air mixed with foreign matter hit the skin of my face. Buildings lie like fallen angels underneath the rain, the charred wood drenched with soot and thick rivers of dirt. What in the fuck happened? I can't breathe and my stomach rolls with confusion. Breaking into a run, I ignore the shouting of my brittle muscles and look at the street signs.

There it is. Revello Drive. My home. Where my mother drew her last startled breath. Where my sister lives- where she sings boy band songs in the shower and brushes her long strands of hair every morning (always getting tons in the sink, which grosses me out to no end).

I stop, my feet skidding on the slick street. A grey sliver of foundation and bits of soggy grass lie where my house used to stand, and I fall to my knees, wondering who the hell did this- and where I can go to kill them. It's not going to be enough though. I have a life. I had a life. That someone obviously took while I was sleeping.

Flashes come to me. My head aches.

Willow. Xander.

Giles.

Oh God.

No.

~~~

No one is alive. I walk alone in this dead town. The sun blankets the sky now with pale orange light, and I glare balefully at it with malevolent eyes. The graveyard is a mess of stone and grass, of greedy dirt and decaying crypts. Bits of bone poke out of the earth, and I feel vomit sting the back of my throat as I wonder if pieces of my mother are trying to escape from the ground.

As I come across Spike's old crypt, tears abruptly make me dizzy. Laying a hand on the stone, I half expect it to vibrate, stir, show something happened here- but all I feel underneath the pads of my fingers is cold, cold rock, smoothed over with rain and drying in the heat of the sky. Shouldn't there have been a warning? I should have known this was going to happen. Why in the hell did I stay blacked out long enough for this—I realize right then that someone must have made sure I was kept in a deep, deep rest while this was going on. While everything I know was being destroyed. I swallow back the bile as I step into his crypt.

Spike is sitting on a chair. Asleep.

Spike. Spike is still here. I watch him closely to make sure I haven't just imagined him, and walk over with careful steps, laying a hand on his cool neck. He's real. Oh, God.

I'm on my back in a second, with a knife to my throat.

The blade feels strange against the skin of my neck, and I stare up at the vampire with his devil eyes. It feels good. He blinks, and then snarls with utter rage.

"Who in the fucking hell are you?" he growls and I almost laugh, but I'm afraid I'll start sobbing, and why would I do that around Spike? He'd just see it as a weakness, and I can't show weakness around him. My heart aches. Mommy… I want to see my mother more than anything in the world right then.

"Spike…" I say, trying to be calm. "It's Buffy. Of course. Who else would it be?"

He blinks again and then shakes his head slowly, as if he's drunk and can't see straight. "You're not Buffy," he enunciates. "Buffy's dead. Chit's been in the ground for four years."

I gulp back new spates of sobs and whisper, "No. I'm here. And would you get off of me? You're cutting off my air supply. I realize that's deemed un-important by undead such as yourself, but I do consider oxygen to be somewhat of a necessity."

He laughs suddenly, hysterically, deep from his throat and belly. And then I feel silver splashes across my cheeks and realize he's crying. "Well Slayer," he murmurs, and his hand is trembling as it cups my cheek. "So you're back. Wait till the lil bit hears about this."

"Spike!" I cry. He's scaring me. I don't know why- perhaps it's just that I've never seen that look in his eyes before. The knife slips a little and I feel the thin slide of blood down my neck, dripping onto the cream of my sweater. Pushing him with all the neglected strength in my contorted muscles, I fling his lithe body across to the raised coffin in the center, and stand, breath coming from my lungs in pants.

"Tell me…" I demand. "What is going on?"

He gleans me for a moment and then rocks back on his heels, his eyes glinting sharp like fire in the dim light. "You don't remember?"

"I told you I don't!" I yell shortly, terrified and yet strangely hopeful. Maybe nothing is as bad as I think. Maybe Giles and Willow and Dawnie and Xander are somewhere else. Maybe they escaped. Maybe they're safe.

"They all died," he tells me flatly. "Glory went down, but the veils between the worlds were open a little too long. Things started to crack and pretty soon, it was a bloody mess. 'Course the Dale went first."

My lips feel chapped as I bite them. "Willow, Xander?" My voice cracks and I wish I could lie down and sleep for a long, long time. I think I need to. Nothing makes sense anymore.

He glances at me briefly, and then continues staring into the middle distance. "All your Scoobies died, blondie. With you missing in action there was nothing they could really do. The little witches played with some spells, but it was too bloody late. Sunnydale was completely gutted, and the demons- they were big fuckers- moved on to LA. After that I have no fucking clue." He draws a cigarette from his pocket and lights it. I watch the smoke with curiously dry eyes and feel myself lean over and vomit into the corner of the crypt.

Hands hold my waist and I hear his whisper- so distant- in my ear. "I thought I'd gotten you out of my head, Slayer. But I remember everything about you, though I wish that I didn't." He smoothes his palm down my flesh and I feel the swell of nausea rise in my sore and torn throat. "The curve of your hip, that blasted vanilla you always wear, your right hook." His mouth rests in the place above my ear and I wish for blackout, for nothingness. I almost wish he would sink his fangs into my pulse and rip into me- because I deserve it. For not being here. "You made me feel like I was a man." With cruel fingers, he whirls me around and spits in my face. "But then you fucking threw yourself off that bloody tower and let everyone fall without you."

I'm shaking, and my teeth rattle against the blood stained walls of my mouth as I whisper brokenly, "I don't know what you're talking about. I didn't die. I just… I just got knocked out. I just went to sleep for a while. I didn't die."

He laughs and grabs my arms, biting into the flesh with razor sharp nails. "Are you fucking blind, sweetheart? You died. Four years ago. And your little gang of sickening buddies? They died three and a half years ago. You're the only one left- haven't you gotten that yet?"

The world shifts, and I think I see stars. Waxy black stars- that whirl before my eyes like ravens, with wings that could crush with the weight of their feathers. In a swirling rush, as air seeps across my face, I remember. The white and blue electricity. The tang of Dawnie's cheek against my lips. Glory. The blood on her lip. The dive into nothingness. The peace.

"Noooo…" I murmur, and my knees crumple.

"Oh yeah," Spike whispers maliciously.

"I'm the only one?" I ask, my eyes still dry and burning.

He cocks his head, and I hear the heavy fall of boots strike the floor of the crypt. "Not exactly, pet."

Glancing up, I see long brown hair and black leather.

"Dawn?"

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