TITLE: Failures
AUTHOR: Mari, aka Cyni1@aol.com
RATING: PG-14
SPOILERS: Through Crush
DISCLAIMER: Joss, not I
FEEDBACK: Makes me a happy lil lunatic 
Failures 
Part One 
She wasn't supposed to be here, she knew that much. Even if that was all she knew. Something was very, very wrong. Her entire body ached as if she had been engaged in the fight of her life, but as far as she could see she didn't carry so much as a bruise. All right, the woman assessed. So physically she was fine. Exhausted and sore, but unhurt. Mentally....well, that was an entirely different subject, wasn't it?

There was the overwhelming, unescapable feeling of her memories being tampered with, though she couldn't for the life of her name why or how. She had been working late on a personal project. The glow of the computer screen was the sole illumination in the room. She glanced up by chance and then, and then....there was a big fat nothingness. "Damn it!" the woman swore, swiping her bangs off her forehead in frustration. She was only frightening herself further by focusing on what she didn't know. It would be better if she started with what she did, like who she was . The woman took a few deep breaths to calm herself and try to slow the breakneck pace of her heart.

"My name is Jenny Calendar," she whispered aloud. 


Part Two 
The angry crashes and thuds has been coming from the back room for over an hour and none of the people out front were overly eager to disturb the source. When the Slayer was angry, fighting dummies suffered. So did, possibly, people who ventured to stick their heads into the room where the Slayer happened to be. No, everyone was quite comfortable out front.

A particularly vicious crash could be heard and Xander winced, knowing he was like as not going to have to build the Buffster another training dummy. "Spike really had Buffy and Drusilla both chained up?" he asked.

"Yep." Willow's answer came to the sound of something splintering.

"And she's wailing on this dummy rather than the undead one why?"

The redhead shrugged. She and Tara were halfheartedly doing research, though neither of them had any real hope of finding something useful. So far none of the texts they had gone through contained big neon signs saying, 'Check here for 101 ways to kill a goddess.' Xander sat in a chair across from them with Anya perched happily in his lap. She had decided when he walked through the door that it was a good time for a break. Willow jumped visibly and glanced towards the textbooks sitting next to her on the table as yet another shattering sound was heard. "You know what, Giles, maybe you can just give these assignments to Buffy when she comes out." She looked towards her girlfriend. "Tara and I were going to try out this new spell and, well, Buffy's scaring me."

Another crashing sound and Giles winced, only imagining how much damage his Slayer was doing to the equipment while venting her anger. "Yes, that's fine." The two witches left shortly afterwards and the only sounds in the shop were the turning of pages and the muted sounds of Buffy's training, faded to rhythmic thuds.

The small bell above the door rang out to signal someone entering the shop. The slim, dark haired woman fidgeted unceasingly and her eyes darted about, giving evidence to just how close to panic she really was. The shop had been called Dragon's Cove the last time Jenny set foot in it. She could almost swear that had been less than fort-eight hours ago, but everything had changed. The school, her apartment, everything. This was the last place she could think of that may be able to help her find answers. Her eyes adjusted from the glaring sunlight outside to the dimmer shop interior and Jenny saw a familiar figure standing by a table stacked with books. "Rupert?" she queried softly.

To his credit, Giles managed not to completely fall when he saw the woman that he had loved, that Angelus had killed three years before. He just found his chair and sat down very hard. 


tbc 
I'm really sorry, but I'm officially giving up on this fic. It's going absolutely nowhere and hasn't for long time. I hate giving up on fics and this the first time I've scrapped one for good, but I'm even sorrier about the archive time you had to put in for something that ultimately is worthless. I won't happen again. I normally do a better job of planning out my plots beforehand.

Mari