I am taking away the offending bonds; her wrists are chaffed by manacles of industrial strength rope anchored by black encantations. I note briefly how criss-cross slashes mark her belly .pumpkinbelly. , see material soaked in crimson.

There is rumbling, a thunder begins and it is my heart. It must be. The quiver starts- Not yet. We have to get down and then I can hug her, fall at her feet and cry. Dawn lives.

Crumpling we'll save for later. I realize it's not my soul-quake. Whatever's under us feels like it's going to give, to fall apart real soon and the foundations holding us up in the works of falling away taking everything from beneath our feet.

It's then I notice hers. Bare. They bleed.

"Buffy, it hurts."

"I got it. You're gonna be okay."

All that's left to do now is to get off this godforsaken platform .eh.NOW

Go.

"GO!"

Run, run.

We be sisters alive.

She turns.

"Buffy, it's started."

Her voice is resolute.

"I'm sorry."

I do not know if the others are still alive.

"It doesn't matter."

She starts. I grab her tightly by the shoulders. Warm and tense beneath willful fingers.

"What are you doing?"

Sister, can't you see we've won. Her eyes are luminous, almost wet. Windows shuttering, want to throw them open wide and fly us both.

I can taste the safety, c'mon share the dream.

---

`

Everything. Falls

`

into

`

place.

It all makes sense.

`

`

Vibration inside out. Space shivers thickly. Convulsing-- and it rips into the very fiber of my being. Feels like tearing, sucking, rending innards into spindles of pure *life*. Ribbons of it, pouring, melding, crashing into- of-

I will cleave into a thousand shards. Dawn. So pure.

Freely- unlocking. I have never felt more alive-

~

`

***