Categories > TV > Buffy the Vampire Slayer > Returned to Active Duty
Chapter 2. - Rebirth
0 reviewsAs Willow's relationship with Kennedy rapidly disintegrates, Tara is resurrected by the Powers that Be. But, of course, things can never run smoothly in the Buffyverse.
1Original
Chapter 2. - Rebirth.
The man named Rawn squatted on his haunches against a decidedly rickety-looking wall that was little more than a mass of peeling paint and mildew. The derelict building was somewhere in the vast urban sprawl of Los Angeles. Rawn wasn't exactly sure where in Los Angeles; he hadn't been to the City of Angels for quite a while, and teleporting halfway across the globe had left him a little fuzzy.
Of course, it wasn't like he had even known where he was going, other than the city itself. The exact location within the city that he was supposed to go to hadn't been expressly defined. As usual, Rawn had needed to rely on impulse and intuition, guided by barely understood feelings. Wandering the streets, turning on impulse, following the pressure in the back of his skull, had led him here.
Like a sodding address would be that difficult/, he thought sourly, and more than a little bit petulantly. /But nooo. That wouldn't be anywhere near vague enough for the high and mightys. He cautiously cast a single bloodshot eye at the ceiling, angry but wary of once more inciting their wrath. Bloody gits.
Rawn leaned back against the wall, heedless of the scraps of dessicated paint and soggy mildew that would now be sticking to his jacket. He'd been in worse places. Hell, the shit-hole he'd been born in made this hovel look like a bucolic paradise. Then again, Kai-Chek made your standard Christian Hell look like a health spa.
A warning pulse shivered indescribably across the surface of Rawn's tired mind, and he knew the time was near. If asked, he wouldn't be able to say why, exactly, he knew this to be so. He just did. It was the way his employers always communicated things to him, just beaming knowledge directly into his mind without so much as a by-your-leave.
Most people would have expected something as significant as a resurrection to at least be visually impressive. A flash of blinding light, or a grand display of mystical pyrotechnics. Something, anything to mark such a blatant violation of the laws pf nature. There was none of this. One moment the room was empty except for Rawn, and the next she was just there, sprawled gracelessly on her back, naked as a jaybird.
Rawn rose to his feet with an almost liquid grace, and stepped to the naked woman's side for a better look. Not to ogle her nakedness, of course, because that would be wrong and just a little bit creepy. Well, at least that was mostly not the reason.
His new champion was a pretty young woman in what Rawn guessed was her early twenties, with long honey-blond hair. She was definitely on the voluptuous side, which Rawn firmly approved of. After all, he could remember when the height of womens fashion hadn't meant looking like a half-starved crack-whore.
Even as he studied her unconscious body, a tattoo of a runic symbol began to take shape on the bicep of her right arm, the brilliantly colored ink seeming to seep upwards through her skin. Rawn felt a slight burning sensation as a duplicate tattoo began to form on his chest, directly above his heart.
Rawn frowned. His new champion had a kind, gentle face, even when unconscious. That couldn't bode well. The kind, the gentle, the peaceful; these kinds of people never coped too well with the kind of lifestyle that went with this particular gig. They took it all to heart too readily, the pain, the suffering, the inevitable bloodshed.
Would it kill them, just once, to send me a bitter hard-arse? Someone whose spirit wouldn't be gradually crushed by the shit we always seem to go through?
He shrugged, ignoring his reservations for now. Not that he would be able to change anything anyway. His job was simple; he was the Keeper. All he had to do was keep this new girl alive and on track. He meant to do it too, even if he had to butcher every living, and undead, thing to cross their path. He wanted to see this girl at least reach middle age. Rawn had seen too many people die young, and he was thoroughly sick of it.
Turning, he reached for the blanket he had luckily had the foresight to bring with him, and draped it over the girl's naked form. Now he just had to wait for her to wake up. At least that would give him time to make a fire, to practice using his rudimentary skills at elemental magick. Working with a pyrokinetic for the past decade had led him to slack off somewhat when it came to practicing his fire magicks.
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Before, there had nothing but light, bright and glorious. She had bathed in that light, swam in it, became one with it. There had been no pain, no suffering, no doubt. None of the multitude of negative emotion's that plagued mankind on earth. Only peace, contentment and a deep-seated feeling of belonging.
But deep down, she knew that it was a lie. Not all of it of course, because she did feel all of that. The lie was because she felt something else. She felt loss, a loss so deep and substantial that part of her very soul was missing. And that loss tainted everything else, every scrap of joy, peace and contentment.
Suddenly, there had been a change. A presence, a sense of will and power had floated before her, and it wasn't one of the innumerable others here in the light. This had been something new, something different. Without words, a question was asked and answered. A deal was struck.
Now, that light, that joyous sensation of safety was gone completely. The loss remained, and she buried herself in it, wrapping herself in it like a second skin. It hurt more than she could imagine, but that was alright. For it was the truth, and it was her truth alone, utterly hers. It let her know that she was alive.
Air rocketed explosively into lungs that mere moments before had not existed. Tara Maclay's eyes snapped open, and she bolted upright.
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"Your shirt?"
Rawn looked curiously at his new champion. She'd taken a single, shuddering breath and sprang upright with the force of a fired catapult. It was sheer luck on her part that the blanket covering her nudity hadn't been flung away. That wasn't what had pasted the perplexed expression on his tattooed face though.
Your shirt? What the .., /he thought bemusedly. /As first words go, that's ... a little odd. He shrugged. Rawn knew full well that he wasn't one to criticize. He had more than his own share of peculiar little quirks. Not counting the slight, occasional homicidal tendencies.
Tara darted her eyes around the decrepit room in a panic, shoulders hunched and face angled downwards so that her hair fell around her face like a curtain. Suddenly, she realized that she was naked, and clutched the scant cover of her blanket even closer to her chest.
Her eyes finally spotted Rawn, sitting cross-legged in the deepest patch of shadow in the room, and Tara froze, studying him with the intensity of prey spotting its predator. The small campfire burning merrily approximately halfway between them shed enough flickering light for Tara to make out some details.
He was tall; she could tell that even with him sitting. Lean as well, with the build of a long-distance runner. His clothes were nondescript, if somewhat scruffy and dirty. His face was slyly handsome in a roguish fashion. Ragged, shoulder-length pitch black hair, streaked here and there with locks of dark crimson, and a prominent facial tattoo gave him a somewhat feral, dangerous aspect.
The tattoo itself was remarkable; a broken circle that ran around his left eye socket, with a wedge shaped slash passing through it on an angle. The eyelid itself was tattooed completely black, so that when he blinked it was if his left eye had been gouged out. It's most remarkable aspect, however, was it's color. The tattoo was black, but a deep, vivid black that glistened even in the darkness.
Rawn smiled, and Tara blinked, broken from a near hypnotized state as she stared at his tattoo.
"Welcome back, Tara." His voice was bland and comforting, but even still Tara scrambled awkwardly backwards until her back hit the wall.
"H... how do you k.... know my n... n.. name?" Tara stammered. Rawn very carefully remained as still as possible, trying not to make any kind of movement that could be construed as threatening. His new champion seemed a little timid at the moment. It was to be expected; coming back from the dead left most people a little on the fragile side.
"I know a few things about you, Tara. Starting with ... well obviously I know your name is Tara. I also know you're a practicing witch." He paused briefly, as if thinking carefully. "Oh, and you're a lesbian. Good for you," he added cheerfully.
"Oh, and apparently you've been dead for the past three years." Tara shook her head desperately in response to this, repeatedly muttering the word 'No' under her breath.
Rawn shrugged again and leaned back against the wall. He wasn't overly concerned by this behavior; the process of resurrection wasn't an easy undertaking. Having your soul shifted from one plane of existence to another in such a profound manner tended to mess a person up. He'd only start worrying if this kind of behavior persisted.
"What's the last thing you remember, Tara?" he asked softly. Tara's rambling denials trailed off into a tension-charge silence, and when she finally glanced up at him through the fringe of her hair, Tara's face was twisted in confusion and fear.
"I c.. can't remem..mb..ber anything!" she blurted. "I ..." Rawn shushed the terrified witch with what was meant to be a soothing gesture. All it achieved was to make Tara huddle in on herself even more. Rawn bit back a particularly salty curse with difficulty.
Bloody amnesia! You've got to be kidding me! What is this, Day's of our Supernatural Lives? Silly bastards better have a good reason for this. Rawn scowled. Not that they would tell me even if they did.
"It's okay, Tara. You're going to be fine. I'm sure this is just temporary, okay? Just a temporary side-effect of your resurrection."
"I ... I w..was d..dead?" Tara asked haltingly, and Rawn nodded in confirmation. "H..How? How did I d..die?"
"I'm not sure, really." Rawn replied matter-of-factly with a shrug. "Going by that scar you've got on your chest, I'll hazard a guess and say you copped a bullet."
"I w..was shot?" Tara paused briefly. "H..how do you k..know about a s..scar on my c..chest?"
"Well, you didn't appear with that blanket on you, so take a wild guess how I know." For a short time, Tara's only response was a vivid blush.
"Do I k..know you?" Tara asked once she had regained a fraction of what little composure she possessed at the moment.
"Before now? Nope. Never seen each other in our lives."
"T..then how d..do you k..know anything a..about me?" Rawn's private estimation of Tara went up a notch. She was definitely not an easy one to fool.
"Good question. They told me."
"T..they who?"
"The PTB's." Rawn saw the confused expression on her face, even through the concealing curtain of her hair, and explained in deeper detail. "The Powers That Be, Tara. Them upstairs, the bigwigs, so-on-and-so-forth. The tell me things, like your name, and where to find you. That sort of thing. They're the same ones that brought you back."
"Oh." Silence reigned briefly, and Tara could just make out the sound of rain pattering against the dilapidated roof.
"You want to get dressed?" Rawn finally asked. "It's not much, mind you. Just some sweats, but I suppose it's better than nothing, right?"
Tara nodded shyly, and Rawn rose smoothly to his feet, grabbing a knapsack that had been hidden in the shadows. He moved closer and handed the knapsack to Tara.
As he approached, Tara noticed that he moved with a dance-like grace, and some forgotten memory told her that this man knew how to fight, and fight well. He was dangerous, or at the very least he had the capacity to be so. Briefly, she wondered exactly how she knew that. Had she been trained to fight?
Tara cast these questions aside for the time being, and glanced hesitantly at the man standing expectantly in front of her.
"What?" he asked cluelessly.
"C..could you t..turn around?"
Rawn blinked in surprise; even after all his time amongst them, he still occasionally forgot how uptight humans could be about casual nudity. Shrugging, he obligingly turned his back. Tara waited for a minute to make sure that he wouldn't turn around, and then swiftly changed into the drab, but clean set of sweats she found in the knapsack.
"Sorry about the lack of underwear." Rawn piped up as Tara was slipping into the clothes as swiftly as she could. " I'm not exactly an expert in ladies undergarments, so you'll have to go commando for the time being."
Fully clothed, Tara felt marginally more confident. Which meant that she was only a fraction less terrified. Utilizing a well of courage Tara somehow felt surprised to possess, she decided to act. Even if she could barely remember anything about herself beyond her name, Tara got the impression that she wasn't normally very brave or confrontational.
Glancing around for something that might somehow aid her in her current predicament, Tara's eyes fell upon a two-by-four leaning against the wall not far from her. With a final gulp, she gingerly sneaked over to the solid length of wood and carefully clutched it in both hands.
As she did, a sudden noise almost made her heart leap clear out of her chest. As she struggled to restrain her racing heartbeat, Tara finally realized what the sound was. Rawn was softly whistling. Despite her misgivings as to this stranger's intentions towards her, Tara found herself oddly captivated, and moved closer, her makeshift club forgotten in her hands.
The tune that Rawn whistled was soft and melancholy, and it spoke wordlessly of heartfelt pain and loss. Emotion's that suddenly sparked a fragment of memory in the witch's confused mind. It was just a single word, there and then gone in a flash. Willow.
Tara had no idea what it meant, but the way that her heart swelled clearly meant that whatever it did mean was incredibly important to her. That certainty steeled her resolve to act, even as Rawn's tune trailed off into silence.
"Hey, are you done yet? 'Cause, fun as staring into a fire is, I can only do it for so long before I ..." Rawn's idle rambling was violently disrupted as Tara swung the two-by-four with all her might into the side of his head. Rawn swayed as blood trickled from a gash on his temple, then fell to his knees with a stunned groan.
"Wha..." he managed to slur before Tara hit him again, this time on the crown of his skull with sufficient force to crack her makeshift weapon. Rawn pitched forward, senseless, as Tara dropped the two-by-four and ran.
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She erupted from the derelict building as if chased by the proverbial hounds from hell, and was almost instantly soaked to the bone by the pelting rain. A quick scan of her surroundings managed to tell her only that she had no idea where she was, so Tara picked a direction at random and ran.
She had no idea where she was running to, or how to get there, or even what she would find there. All Tara knew was that every fiber of her being desired ... no, needed it. So she ran, vanishing into the rain, lost and alone.
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Pain. That was the first thing to return to Rawn. Rawn was familiar with pain, considered it an old friend. One he could do without seeing for a decade or two, but still a friend. Pain drove him, kept him moving, told him that he was still alive. One of the first lessons a child learned in Kai-Chek was to keep moving. To stop was to court death.
He blinked, wincing at the pain from his head. What the vrak happened? He thought groggily. The/ last thing I remember is talking to Tara and then ... Bollocks! She bloody well clobbered me!/
Ignoring his battered body's complaints, Rawn slowly dragged himself to his feet, swaying like a drunk after a week long bender. Cautiously, in case his head followed its first instinct and fell off, he surveyed the room. Empty. Bloody fantastic job, Rawn. She's known you for what, ten minutes max? And she's already done a runner. Good show indeed, you daft pillock.
Gingerly rubbing at the gash on his temple, Rawn focused his attention inward, specifically at the thread of sensation linked to the newly-formed tattoo on his chest. He fed his consciousness into that thread and focused.
He could feel her now, southeast from his current position and running fast. He got a brief flash of emotion through the bond; felt Tara's fear, her confusion and an overwhelming desire for something or someone she didn't understand.
Shakily at first, Rawn began to follow her. Hopefully she'd stay out of trouble long enough to track her down and hopefully explain things a bit better.
Well, that could have gone better. What is it about me that makes such a crappy first impression?, he grumbled to himself. Still, it went better than the last time, with Dana. At least I didn't get set on fire this time.
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Tara was rapidly beginning to regret abandoning her blanket back at the abandoned building. It might have possibly provided some cover, however briefly, from the torrential rainfall that was still bombarding L.A. Still, even if she'd been willing to consider taking the risk of returning for it, Tara had taken so many turns and shortcuts that she was unconditionally lost. So she wandered the deserted streets, hugging herself in a desperate attempt to keep warm.
Glancing around, Tara briefly wondered why such a large city seemed to be deserted. I guess I'm the only person silly enough to be out in this weather. Plus, this doesn't seem to be a very heavily populated area.
In point of fact, the blond Wicca was spot on with her guess; the suburb in which Tara found herself was filled mainly with warehouses, liberally interspersed with the occasional derelict building. It told a sad tale of slow, but inexorable, economic and social decline. So it wasn't a great surprise that amongst the area's few denizens was counted a small nest of vampires. The same three vampires that were now stalking Tara through the deluge.
Soaked to the skin now, Tara realized that she had to find shelter, any shelter, and soon. Even now, she could barely restrain her shivering. Selecting an alley at random, she stumbled down it, peering to either side for any form of shelter. Before long, she found herself confronting a dead-end, and the blond's shoulders sagged in defeat. Turning to retrace her steps, Tara froze.
Blocking her way were three men, clad in filthy work clothes that were as wet through as her own. The expressions on their faces were decidedly unwelcoming.
"C..can I h..help you?" Tara asked cautiously, feeling adrenaline begin to flood her bloodstream. An instinct she couldn't explain was telling her to run, but run where? The only exit from the alley was blocked by the three newcomers.
"Oh yeah, babe," replied the central figure. All three smiled, cruel and predatory, all teeth and evil intentions. "You can help us."
With that, all three vampires morphed into their game faces. Tara screamed and stumbled backwards as they advanced menacingly, fangs flashing. As her back hit the back of the alley, the Wicca heard a voice in her mind. Vampires/, the voice informed her as she cowered in fear. /Crucifix, holy water, wooden stake in the heart, decapitation, sunlight ... and fire.
Eyes narrowing, Tara straightened, the same steel core of courage she had found earlier coming coming once more to the fore. Even now, she still felt surprised that she possessed such strength. Why did whoever she had been have such little faith in herself? Whatever the reason, now was not the time for such questions.
Raising her hand, Tara felt power run through her, swelling inside until it felt like she would burst. The vampires' overly confident, sniggering laughter ceased suddenly as Tara's eyes flashed as black as sin. Tara didn't know how, but she rode that power, harnessed it, even as it somehow felt wrong to her.
"Inncendre," Tara spat with crystal-clear inflection, all trace of her usual stutter obliterated. The central vampire instantly ignited, transformed in a heartbeat into a standing inferno. As the burning vampire exploded into a cloud of dust, his companion on the left recoiled sideways, collapsing into the pile of refuse laying there. His other companion was more proactive in his reaction.
"Witch!" howled the vampire as he lunged at the blond in a blur of motion. Too slow, her attention shifted to her attacker. Even as Tara sought to refocus the power boiling within her, the vampire snatched her by the throat and slammed her backwards, her skull bouncing painfully off the wall.
The power drained out of her like water through a sieve, and the black faded from her eyes. Tara struggled impotently, flailing wildly at her attacker. Ignoring the witch's helpless attempts to free herself, the vampire slammed his prey against the wall again with a bestial giggle of demonic glee. His grip around Tara's throat tightened, and black spots began to float in her vision from lack of oxygen.
A figure fell from the heavens, or more accurately, from the roof of one of the buildings overlooking the alley. There was a flash of steel, glinting silver in the darkness, and the vampire reeled backwards, screaming. The arm that had been gripping Tara was cleanly severed at the elbow.
Even as the severed limb dissolved into ash, Tara's rescuer landed in a roll and spun, still in a crouch. The long, curved, broad-bladed dagger in his hand darted out with inhuman speed, and the vampire staggered backwards, keening in rage and pain as long unused organs spilled from his disemboweled stomach.
Tara fell to her knees, gratefully gulping down oxygen as her savior rose with preternatural grace. It was only then that she recognized the man from the derelict building, and she wondered if she was now in more, or less danger.
"Ya see what happens when you whack me in the head, and run off into the city alone in the middle of a thunderstorm?" Rawn quipped, throwing a feral grin in Tara's direction. "It's a rookie mistake, but don't sweat it. I still like ya."
Tara barely restrained a frightened yelp. It was the same man who had been there when she awoke; of that she was positive. The clothes, the hair, the tattoo, all of these were the same. But his face was no longer human.
Rawn's eyebrows had vanished, replaced by a single, jutting, sharp-edged ridge that ran above both eyes and circled down to the mid-point of each eye. Each of which were now a deep, blazing violet color. A second ridge ran at right angles to the first, up the bridge of his nose and continuing into his hairline. Similar ridges jutted from his cheekbones, and his grin revealed a mouth filled with vicious, pointed teeth.
Rawn's attention returned to the incensed vampire before him. "And you!" He wagged a finger of his empty hand at his opponent in an absurdly chiding motion. "Bad fang-face, bad. You're not allowed to touch. No more innocent victims for you. Mainly because you're about to be ash blowing in the wind, but hey, what'dja gonna do?"
The vampire charged, face even more twisted by a hateful snarl, only to be met with a straight kick to the stomach. The blow hit him hard enough to send the vamp flying ten feet back down the alley.
The third vampire rose from the garbage he'd crashed into, finally returning to the fight. He leapt, arms outstretched and fangs bared. Rawn easily sidestepped the vampire, catching one of its hands in his own and spinning it down and behind. Something snapped in the vampire's shoulder as its arm was twisted into an arm-lock. A swift snap-kick to the back of one leg drove the bloodsucker to its knees, and Rawn slashed his dagger against the back of his neck, neatly and precisely severing the vampire's spinal column.
Rawn let the vampire flop bonelessly to the ground face first. The wound was hardly fatal to his opponent, and would heal completely, given time and lots of blood. But until it did, the vampire was paralyzed, and as such, easy prey. Dropping to one knee in the center of the demon's back, Rawn reversed his dagger with an twirling flourish, and placed the curved blade squarely in the cut he'd already made. Pushing down with all his weight, the dagger sliced cleanly through the vampire's neck to strike sparks from the ground as the bloodsucker turned to dust.
The final vampire, one-armed and gutted, regained his feet at the same time that Rawn rose to his. With a rage-filled snarl, the vampire charged. Rawn waited until the last moment to react, then leapt to one side as his dagger lashed out, ripping through the vampire's throat. The vampire staggered, stolen blood streaming from the wound that had half severed it's head. Behind the demon, Rawn lashed out with a spinning kick that knocked that self-same head all the way off.
As the vampire burst into a cloud of ash that Rawn calmly walked through, his face morphed back into the marginally less unsettling human face he had worn before. Standing before her, he bounced up and down on the balls of his feet like an over sized, hyperactive child.
"Little sister, you look like a drowned rat," declared Rawn with a grin, shrugging his hooded, oilskin coat off and offering it to the blond wicca. Tara cautiously accepted it and slipped it on. The inside of the coat was surprisingly dry and still warm from it's owner's body, and Tara hugged it closer, grateful even for that small comfort. As she glanced back at him, Rawn extended a hand to Tara where she still huddled against the wall of the alley.
"What say we get out of this rain, and I try to explain just what the hell's going on." Rawn stood in the rain with a small smile on his lips as Tara looked at his outstretched hand as if it where a poisonous serpent poised to strike. Finally, with a great deal of trepidation, she gingerly took his hand in her own.
The man named Rawn squatted on his haunches against a decidedly rickety-looking wall that was little more than a mass of peeling paint and mildew. The derelict building was somewhere in the vast urban sprawl of Los Angeles. Rawn wasn't exactly sure where in Los Angeles; he hadn't been to the City of Angels for quite a while, and teleporting halfway across the globe had left him a little fuzzy.
Of course, it wasn't like he had even known where he was going, other than the city itself. The exact location within the city that he was supposed to go to hadn't been expressly defined. As usual, Rawn had needed to rely on impulse and intuition, guided by barely understood feelings. Wandering the streets, turning on impulse, following the pressure in the back of his skull, had led him here.
Like a sodding address would be that difficult/, he thought sourly, and more than a little bit petulantly. /But nooo. That wouldn't be anywhere near vague enough for the high and mightys. He cautiously cast a single bloodshot eye at the ceiling, angry but wary of once more inciting their wrath. Bloody gits.
Rawn leaned back against the wall, heedless of the scraps of dessicated paint and soggy mildew that would now be sticking to his jacket. He'd been in worse places. Hell, the shit-hole he'd been born in made this hovel look like a bucolic paradise. Then again, Kai-Chek made your standard Christian Hell look like a health spa.
A warning pulse shivered indescribably across the surface of Rawn's tired mind, and he knew the time was near. If asked, he wouldn't be able to say why, exactly, he knew this to be so. He just did. It was the way his employers always communicated things to him, just beaming knowledge directly into his mind without so much as a by-your-leave.
Most people would have expected something as significant as a resurrection to at least be visually impressive. A flash of blinding light, or a grand display of mystical pyrotechnics. Something, anything to mark such a blatant violation of the laws pf nature. There was none of this. One moment the room was empty except for Rawn, and the next she was just there, sprawled gracelessly on her back, naked as a jaybird.
Rawn rose to his feet with an almost liquid grace, and stepped to the naked woman's side for a better look. Not to ogle her nakedness, of course, because that would be wrong and just a little bit creepy. Well, at least that was mostly not the reason.
His new champion was a pretty young woman in what Rawn guessed was her early twenties, with long honey-blond hair. She was definitely on the voluptuous side, which Rawn firmly approved of. After all, he could remember when the height of womens fashion hadn't meant looking like a half-starved crack-whore.
Even as he studied her unconscious body, a tattoo of a runic symbol began to take shape on the bicep of her right arm, the brilliantly colored ink seeming to seep upwards through her skin. Rawn felt a slight burning sensation as a duplicate tattoo began to form on his chest, directly above his heart.
Rawn frowned. His new champion had a kind, gentle face, even when unconscious. That couldn't bode well. The kind, the gentle, the peaceful; these kinds of people never coped too well with the kind of lifestyle that went with this particular gig. They took it all to heart too readily, the pain, the suffering, the inevitable bloodshed.
Would it kill them, just once, to send me a bitter hard-arse? Someone whose spirit wouldn't be gradually crushed by the shit we always seem to go through?
He shrugged, ignoring his reservations for now. Not that he would be able to change anything anyway. His job was simple; he was the Keeper. All he had to do was keep this new girl alive and on track. He meant to do it too, even if he had to butcher every living, and undead, thing to cross their path. He wanted to see this girl at least reach middle age. Rawn had seen too many people die young, and he was thoroughly sick of it.
Turning, he reached for the blanket he had luckily had the foresight to bring with him, and draped it over the girl's naked form. Now he just had to wait for her to wake up. At least that would give him time to make a fire, to practice using his rudimentary skills at elemental magick. Working with a pyrokinetic for the past decade had led him to slack off somewhat when it came to practicing his fire magicks.
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Before, there had nothing but light, bright and glorious. She had bathed in that light, swam in it, became one with it. There had been no pain, no suffering, no doubt. None of the multitude of negative emotion's that plagued mankind on earth. Only peace, contentment and a deep-seated feeling of belonging.
But deep down, she knew that it was a lie. Not all of it of course, because she did feel all of that. The lie was because she felt something else. She felt loss, a loss so deep and substantial that part of her very soul was missing. And that loss tainted everything else, every scrap of joy, peace and contentment.
Suddenly, there had been a change. A presence, a sense of will and power had floated before her, and it wasn't one of the innumerable others here in the light. This had been something new, something different. Without words, a question was asked and answered. A deal was struck.
Now, that light, that joyous sensation of safety was gone completely. The loss remained, and she buried herself in it, wrapping herself in it like a second skin. It hurt more than she could imagine, but that was alright. For it was the truth, and it was her truth alone, utterly hers. It let her know that she was alive.
Air rocketed explosively into lungs that mere moments before had not existed. Tara Maclay's eyes snapped open, and she bolted upright.
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"Your shirt?"
Rawn looked curiously at his new champion. She'd taken a single, shuddering breath and sprang upright with the force of a fired catapult. It was sheer luck on her part that the blanket covering her nudity hadn't been flung away. That wasn't what had pasted the perplexed expression on his tattooed face though.
Your shirt? What the .., /he thought bemusedly. /As first words go, that's ... a little odd. He shrugged. Rawn knew full well that he wasn't one to criticize. He had more than his own share of peculiar little quirks. Not counting the slight, occasional homicidal tendencies.
Tara darted her eyes around the decrepit room in a panic, shoulders hunched and face angled downwards so that her hair fell around her face like a curtain. Suddenly, she realized that she was naked, and clutched the scant cover of her blanket even closer to her chest.
Her eyes finally spotted Rawn, sitting cross-legged in the deepest patch of shadow in the room, and Tara froze, studying him with the intensity of prey spotting its predator. The small campfire burning merrily approximately halfway between them shed enough flickering light for Tara to make out some details.
He was tall; she could tell that even with him sitting. Lean as well, with the build of a long-distance runner. His clothes were nondescript, if somewhat scruffy and dirty. His face was slyly handsome in a roguish fashion. Ragged, shoulder-length pitch black hair, streaked here and there with locks of dark crimson, and a prominent facial tattoo gave him a somewhat feral, dangerous aspect.
The tattoo itself was remarkable; a broken circle that ran around his left eye socket, with a wedge shaped slash passing through it on an angle. The eyelid itself was tattooed completely black, so that when he blinked it was if his left eye had been gouged out. It's most remarkable aspect, however, was it's color. The tattoo was black, but a deep, vivid black that glistened even in the darkness.
Rawn smiled, and Tara blinked, broken from a near hypnotized state as she stared at his tattoo.
"Welcome back, Tara." His voice was bland and comforting, but even still Tara scrambled awkwardly backwards until her back hit the wall.
"H... how do you k.... know my n... n.. name?" Tara stammered. Rawn very carefully remained as still as possible, trying not to make any kind of movement that could be construed as threatening. His new champion seemed a little timid at the moment. It was to be expected; coming back from the dead left most people a little on the fragile side.
"I know a few things about you, Tara. Starting with ... well obviously I know your name is Tara. I also know you're a practicing witch." He paused briefly, as if thinking carefully. "Oh, and you're a lesbian. Good for you," he added cheerfully.
"Oh, and apparently you've been dead for the past three years." Tara shook her head desperately in response to this, repeatedly muttering the word 'No' under her breath.
Rawn shrugged again and leaned back against the wall. He wasn't overly concerned by this behavior; the process of resurrection wasn't an easy undertaking. Having your soul shifted from one plane of existence to another in such a profound manner tended to mess a person up. He'd only start worrying if this kind of behavior persisted.
"What's the last thing you remember, Tara?" he asked softly. Tara's rambling denials trailed off into a tension-charge silence, and when she finally glanced up at him through the fringe of her hair, Tara's face was twisted in confusion and fear.
"I c.. can't remem..mb..ber anything!" she blurted. "I ..." Rawn shushed the terrified witch with what was meant to be a soothing gesture. All it achieved was to make Tara huddle in on herself even more. Rawn bit back a particularly salty curse with difficulty.
Bloody amnesia! You've got to be kidding me! What is this, Day's of our Supernatural Lives? Silly bastards better have a good reason for this. Rawn scowled. Not that they would tell me even if they did.
"It's okay, Tara. You're going to be fine. I'm sure this is just temporary, okay? Just a temporary side-effect of your resurrection."
"I ... I w..was d..dead?" Tara asked haltingly, and Rawn nodded in confirmation. "H..How? How did I d..die?"
"I'm not sure, really." Rawn replied matter-of-factly with a shrug. "Going by that scar you've got on your chest, I'll hazard a guess and say you copped a bullet."
"I w..was shot?" Tara paused briefly. "H..how do you k..know about a s..scar on my c..chest?"
"Well, you didn't appear with that blanket on you, so take a wild guess how I know." For a short time, Tara's only response was a vivid blush.
"Do I k..know you?" Tara asked once she had regained a fraction of what little composure she possessed at the moment.
"Before now? Nope. Never seen each other in our lives."
"T..then how d..do you k..know anything a..about me?" Rawn's private estimation of Tara went up a notch. She was definitely not an easy one to fool.
"Good question. They told me."
"T..they who?"
"The PTB's." Rawn saw the confused expression on her face, even through the concealing curtain of her hair, and explained in deeper detail. "The Powers That Be, Tara. Them upstairs, the bigwigs, so-on-and-so-forth. The tell me things, like your name, and where to find you. That sort of thing. They're the same ones that brought you back."
"Oh." Silence reigned briefly, and Tara could just make out the sound of rain pattering against the dilapidated roof.
"You want to get dressed?" Rawn finally asked. "It's not much, mind you. Just some sweats, but I suppose it's better than nothing, right?"
Tara nodded shyly, and Rawn rose smoothly to his feet, grabbing a knapsack that had been hidden in the shadows. He moved closer and handed the knapsack to Tara.
As he approached, Tara noticed that he moved with a dance-like grace, and some forgotten memory told her that this man knew how to fight, and fight well. He was dangerous, or at the very least he had the capacity to be so. Briefly, she wondered exactly how she knew that. Had she been trained to fight?
Tara cast these questions aside for the time being, and glanced hesitantly at the man standing expectantly in front of her.
"What?" he asked cluelessly.
"C..could you t..turn around?"
Rawn blinked in surprise; even after all his time amongst them, he still occasionally forgot how uptight humans could be about casual nudity. Shrugging, he obligingly turned his back. Tara waited for a minute to make sure that he wouldn't turn around, and then swiftly changed into the drab, but clean set of sweats she found in the knapsack.
"Sorry about the lack of underwear." Rawn piped up as Tara was slipping into the clothes as swiftly as she could. " I'm not exactly an expert in ladies undergarments, so you'll have to go commando for the time being."
Fully clothed, Tara felt marginally more confident. Which meant that she was only a fraction less terrified. Utilizing a well of courage Tara somehow felt surprised to possess, she decided to act. Even if she could barely remember anything about herself beyond her name, Tara got the impression that she wasn't normally very brave or confrontational.
Glancing around for something that might somehow aid her in her current predicament, Tara's eyes fell upon a two-by-four leaning against the wall not far from her. With a final gulp, she gingerly sneaked over to the solid length of wood and carefully clutched it in both hands.
As she did, a sudden noise almost made her heart leap clear out of her chest. As she struggled to restrain her racing heartbeat, Tara finally realized what the sound was. Rawn was softly whistling. Despite her misgivings as to this stranger's intentions towards her, Tara found herself oddly captivated, and moved closer, her makeshift club forgotten in her hands.
The tune that Rawn whistled was soft and melancholy, and it spoke wordlessly of heartfelt pain and loss. Emotion's that suddenly sparked a fragment of memory in the witch's confused mind. It was just a single word, there and then gone in a flash. Willow.
Tara had no idea what it meant, but the way that her heart swelled clearly meant that whatever it did mean was incredibly important to her. That certainty steeled her resolve to act, even as Rawn's tune trailed off into silence.
"Hey, are you done yet? 'Cause, fun as staring into a fire is, I can only do it for so long before I ..." Rawn's idle rambling was violently disrupted as Tara swung the two-by-four with all her might into the side of his head. Rawn swayed as blood trickled from a gash on his temple, then fell to his knees with a stunned groan.
"Wha..." he managed to slur before Tara hit him again, this time on the crown of his skull with sufficient force to crack her makeshift weapon. Rawn pitched forward, senseless, as Tara dropped the two-by-four and ran.
----------
She erupted from the derelict building as if chased by the proverbial hounds from hell, and was almost instantly soaked to the bone by the pelting rain. A quick scan of her surroundings managed to tell her only that she had no idea where she was, so Tara picked a direction at random and ran.
She had no idea where she was running to, or how to get there, or even what she would find there. All Tara knew was that every fiber of her being desired ... no, needed it. So she ran, vanishing into the rain, lost and alone.
----------
Pain. That was the first thing to return to Rawn. Rawn was familiar with pain, considered it an old friend. One he could do without seeing for a decade or two, but still a friend. Pain drove him, kept him moving, told him that he was still alive. One of the first lessons a child learned in Kai-Chek was to keep moving. To stop was to court death.
He blinked, wincing at the pain from his head. What the vrak happened? He thought groggily. The/ last thing I remember is talking to Tara and then ... Bollocks! She bloody well clobbered me!/
Ignoring his battered body's complaints, Rawn slowly dragged himself to his feet, swaying like a drunk after a week long bender. Cautiously, in case his head followed its first instinct and fell off, he surveyed the room. Empty. Bloody fantastic job, Rawn. She's known you for what, ten minutes max? And she's already done a runner. Good show indeed, you daft pillock.
Gingerly rubbing at the gash on his temple, Rawn focused his attention inward, specifically at the thread of sensation linked to the newly-formed tattoo on his chest. He fed his consciousness into that thread and focused.
He could feel her now, southeast from his current position and running fast. He got a brief flash of emotion through the bond; felt Tara's fear, her confusion and an overwhelming desire for something or someone she didn't understand.
Shakily at first, Rawn began to follow her. Hopefully she'd stay out of trouble long enough to track her down and hopefully explain things a bit better.
Well, that could have gone better. What is it about me that makes such a crappy first impression?, he grumbled to himself. Still, it went better than the last time, with Dana. At least I didn't get set on fire this time.
----------
Tara was rapidly beginning to regret abandoning her blanket back at the abandoned building. It might have possibly provided some cover, however briefly, from the torrential rainfall that was still bombarding L.A. Still, even if she'd been willing to consider taking the risk of returning for it, Tara had taken so many turns and shortcuts that she was unconditionally lost. So she wandered the deserted streets, hugging herself in a desperate attempt to keep warm.
Glancing around, Tara briefly wondered why such a large city seemed to be deserted. I guess I'm the only person silly enough to be out in this weather. Plus, this doesn't seem to be a very heavily populated area.
In point of fact, the blond Wicca was spot on with her guess; the suburb in which Tara found herself was filled mainly with warehouses, liberally interspersed with the occasional derelict building. It told a sad tale of slow, but inexorable, economic and social decline. So it wasn't a great surprise that amongst the area's few denizens was counted a small nest of vampires. The same three vampires that were now stalking Tara through the deluge.
Soaked to the skin now, Tara realized that she had to find shelter, any shelter, and soon. Even now, she could barely restrain her shivering. Selecting an alley at random, she stumbled down it, peering to either side for any form of shelter. Before long, she found herself confronting a dead-end, and the blond's shoulders sagged in defeat. Turning to retrace her steps, Tara froze.
Blocking her way were three men, clad in filthy work clothes that were as wet through as her own. The expressions on their faces were decidedly unwelcoming.
"C..can I h..help you?" Tara asked cautiously, feeling adrenaline begin to flood her bloodstream. An instinct she couldn't explain was telling her to run, but run where? The only exit from the alley was blocked by the three newcomers.
"Oh yeah, babe," replied the central figure. All three smiled, cruel and predatory, all teeth and evil intentions. "You can help us."
With that, all three vampires morphed into their game faces. Tara screamed and stumbled backwards as they advanced menacingly, fangs flashing. As her back hit the back of the alley, the Wicca heard a voice in her mind. Vampires/, the voice informed her as she cowered in fear. /Crucifix, holy water, wooden stake in the heart, decapitation, sunlight ... and fire.
Eyes narrowing, Tara straightened, the same steel core of courage she had found earlier coming coming once more to the fore. Even now, she still felt surprised that she possessed such strength. Why did whoever she had been have such little faith in herself? Whatever the reason, now was not the time for such questions.
Raising her hand, Tara felt power run through her, swelling inside until it felt like she would burst. The vampires' overly confident, sniggering laughter ceased suddenly as Tara's eyes flashed as black as sin. Tara didn't know how, but she rode that power, harnessed it, even as it somehow felt wrong to her.
"Inncendre," Tara spat with crystal-clear inflection, all trace of her usual stutter obliterated. The central vampire instantly ignited, transformed in a heartbeat into a standing inferno. As the burning vampire exploded into a cloud of dust, his companion on the left recoiled sideways, collapsing into the pile of refuse laying there. His other companion was more proactive in his reaction.
"Witch!" howled the vampire as he lunged at the blond in a blur of motion. Too slow, her attention shifted to her attacker. Even as Tara sought to refocus the power boiling within her, the vampire snatched her by the throat and slammed her backwards, her skull bouncing painfully off the wall.
The power drained out of her like water through a sieve, and the black faded from her eyes. Tara struggled impotently, flailing wildly at her attacker. Ignoring the witch's helpless attempts to free herself, the vampire slammed his prey against the wall again with a bestial giggle of demonic glee. His grip around Tara's throat tightened, and black spots began to float in her vision from lack of oxygen.
A figure fell from the heavens, or more accurately, from the roof of one of the buildings overlooking the alley. There was a flash of steel, glinting silver in the darkness, and the vampire reeled backwards, screaming. The arm that had been gripping Tara was cleanly severed at the elbow.
Even as the severed limb dissolved into ash, Tara's rescuer landed in a roll and spun, still in a crouch. The long, curved, broad-bladed dagger in his hand darted out with inhuman speed, and the vampire staggered backwards, keening in rage and pain as long unused organs spilled from his disemboweled stomach.
Tara fell to her knees, gratefully gulping down oxygen as her savior rose with preternatural grace. It was only then that she recognized the man from the derelict building, and she wondered if she was now in more, or less danger.
"Ya see what happens when you whack me in the head, and run off into the city alone in the middle of a thunderstorm?" Rawn quipped, throwing a feral grin in Tara's direction. "It's a rookie mistake, but don't sweat it. I still like ya."
Tara barely restrained a frightened yelp. It was the same man who had been there when she awoke; of that she was positive. The clothes, the hair, the tattoo, all of these were the same. But his face was no longer human.
Rawn's eyebrows had vanished, replaced by a single, jutting, sharp-edged ridge that ran above both eyes and circled down to the mid-point of each eye. Each of which were now a deep, blazing violet color. A second ridge ran at right angles to the first, up the bridge of his nose and continuing into his hairline. Similar ridges jutted from his cheekbones, and his grin revealed a mouth filled with vicious, pointed teeth.
Rawn's attention returned to the incensed vampire before him. "And you!" He wagged a finger of his empty hand at his opponent in an absurdly chiding motion. "Bad fang-face, bad. You're not allowed to touch. No more innocent victims for you. Mainly because you're about to be ash blowing in the wind, but hey, what'dja gonna do?"
The vampire charged, face even more twisted by a hateful snarl, only to be met with a straight kick to the stomach. The blow hit him hard enough to send the vamp flying ten feet back down the alley.
The third vampire rose from the garbage he'd crashed into, finally returning to the fight. He leapt, arms outstretched and fangs bared. Rawn easily sidestepped the vampire, catching one of its hands in his own and spinning it down and behind. Something snapped in the vampire's shoulder as its arm was twisted into an arm-lock. A swift snap-kick to the back of one leg drove the bloodsucker to its knees, and Rawn slashed his dagger against the back of his neck, neatly and precisely severing the vampire's spinal column.
Rawn let the vampire flop bonelessly to the ground face first. The wound was hardly fatal to his opponent, and would heal completely, given time and lots of blood. But until it did, the vampire was paralyzed, and as such, easy prey. Dropping to one knee in the center of the demon's back, Rawn reversed his dagger with an twirling flourish, and placed the curved blade squarely in the cut he'd already made. Pushing down with all his weight, the dagger sliced cleanly through the vampire's neck to strike sparks from the ground as the bloodsucker turned to dust.
The final vampire, one-armed and gutted, regained his feet at the same time that Rawn rose to his. With a rage-filled snarl, the vampire charged. Rawn waited until the last moment to react, then leapt to one side as his dagger lashed out, ripping through the vampire's throat. The vampire staggered, stolen blood streaming from the wound that had half severed it's head. Behind the demon, Rawn lashed out with a spinning kick that knocked that self-same head all the way off.
As the vampire burst into a cloud of ash that Rawn calmly walked through, his face morphed back into the marginally less unsettling human face he had worn before. Standing before her, he bounced up and down on the balls of his feet like an over sized, hyperactive child.
"Little sister, you look like a drowned rat," declared Rawn with a grin, shrugging his hooded, oilskin coat off and offering it to the blond wicca. Tara cautiously accepted it and slipped it on. The inside of the coat was surprisingly dry and still warm from it's owner's body, and Tara hugged it closer, grateful even for that small comfort. As she glanced back at him, Rawn extended a hand to Tara where she still huddled against the wall of the alley.
"What say we get out of this rain, and I try to explain just what the hell's going on." Rawn stood in the rain with a small smile on his lips as Tara looked at his outstretched hand as if it where a poisonous serpent poised to strike. Finally, with a great deal of trepidation, she gingerly took his hand in her own.
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