Put your faith in what you most believe in
Two worlds, one family
Trust your heart, let fate decide
To guide these lives we see …

Empty.

She felt empty. Nothing mattered, nothing at all. The sun on her face felt cold, the laughter of the children in the park sounded hollow, and the lively, bustle of the day seemed distant and unimportant. She’d tried the walk in the park, vaguely hoping that spending some time in the sun, moving among the living and being part of the every day, ordinary world would make it difference.

It hadn’t.

She was better off patrolling in the dark, dealing with the dead and doing what she had to do. Because that what she was.

Dead.

Buried.

A corpse recalled to an illusion of life, pretending to be more than it was, imprisoning a soul that should be somewhere else – and had been, not so long ago …

Buffy sighed and sank to the surface of a nearby park bench, letting the distant echoes of the living world wash over her without touching her. Everything was so cold here, the light too harsh, the sounds too shrill, the surfaces too hard and jagged and unpleasant to touch. She’d been happy. Complete. Finished.

And her friends had dragged her back, thinking they were doing her a favour.

"Some favour"; she muttered, kicking petulantly at an empty drink can that cluttered the space at her feet. The kick was backed by Slayer strength; the can flew up – and was caught, snatched neatly from the air before it could do any serious damage.

"Whoa," its interceptor laughed, greeting her with a brilliant smile and a twinkle of bright blue eyes. "I thought I was the only who used these as deadly weapons. You wanna watch who you’re aiming things at."

"I’m sorry," Buffy said, sitting up from her slump and trying to sound as if she meant it. She’d never seen this particular man before – because she would have remembered him if she had. It wasn’t his tousle of blond curls, or the fact that he was scarcely taller than she was that made him so distinctive. It was everything about him somehow; his features suggested warmth and mischief, his stance implied agile alertness, and she had the distinct impression that a sleek and playful creature lurked beneath the nondescript and well worn denim jeans and the dark faded leather jacket. His tie-dyed purple tee-shirt was a little loud, and the gleam of gold that dangled from one ear added a hint of gypsy to his rugged good looks – but for all that, he seemed a pleasant enough individual.

And there was something about him that radiated life – in a way that far outshone the pitiful warmth of the afternoon sun.

"Don’t be"; he advised with a grin, crushing the can with an easy clench of his fingers and tossing it away into the nearby trash can. "No harm done. You’re Buffy, right?"

"Ah – right," she acknowledged warily, glancing around in case someone she did know was lurking nearby. No-one seemed to be. She was sitting in a park full of strangers, in a world shaded with gloom and greys.

"Hmm,"; he observed, sitting down next to her and relaxing into a casual slump, leaning back against the wooden slats of the bench. "You sure about that? You don’t sound very sure."

"I’m sure," she responded, bristling a little at his presumptive intrusion on her personal space. He cocked his head slightly to one side and looked at her, with eyes so blue they could have been painted with the same brush as the sky. Her indignation faded into uncertainty; was she so sure of anything anymore? "Well, I think I’m sure. At least – I was when I got up this morning."

He laughed. No, he giggled – the sort of sound that Xander would have died of embarrassment had he been caught making it. It had an odd, endearing innocence to it - and Buffy warmed to him instantly. "You mean – some days you wake up and you’re not you, or just that some days you’re not sure? One way or the other."

She couldn’t help but smile. "I’m always me," she said, then her face fell. "Just that – some days? There doesn’t seem a lot of point to it. Being me, I mean. How do you know my name?"

"Oh," he said with an airy wave, "I know a lot of things. Been around, you know? Well – maybe you don’t know, but – here you were, sitting here with that look on your face and the feel of forever about you … Kinda made it obvious, really. There aren’t that many of us – souls that get to go, and come back. Not from there, anyway. Lots of souls that go and come back from other places. But they don’t tend to sit around in the sun."

Go – and come back ..?

Buffy stared at him. Could he be – Was he serious?

"I have no idea what you’re talking about,"; she said, opting for the safest response. He was probably just some kind of crazy person, and she probably shouldn’t even be listening to him.

"Yes, you do," he smiled. "It’s okay, you know. To feel – disconnected. Being a part of – of that – well, gotta be a shock to the system coming back here. But being here’s pretty cool, too." He glanced away, smiling at a young mother as she walked past with a toddler in tow. The young mother smiled back, blushed, and hurried away. Buffy stared after her. "Don’t you think?"

"I don’t know what to think," she admitted bleakly. "I don’t know how to get from one moment to the next."

"Ah," he registered. "When I said disconnected …" He paused to look at her with understanding sympathy. "Hard journey, huh?"

She nodded, wondering why it mattered. Why he’d be so concerned, and why she even cared. It was so hard to care. So hard to do anything, when everything was so – harsh, and pointless, and took so much effort.

"That sucks," he said. "But – you know? It’s just a matter of perspective. Glass half empty, glass half full … You’re not there, but you are here – and there are a lot worse places to be, believe me."

"Like you care," she muttered, then grimaced at the bitterness in the remark. That really wasn’t very fair. Maybe he did care. Maybe it mattered to him, even if it didn’t matter to her. After all, she didn’t know this guy from Adam …

He grinned at the sudden, reluctant twist of her smile, the twinkle in his eyes coaxing it to take on a little more life, a little more certainty. She wanted to resist and couldn’t – so she laughed despite herself. Laughed at the joke he couldn’t possibly understand.

"That’s better," he teased, reaching gentle fingers to brush a stray lock away from her face. His touch was startling, and she jerked away with a gasp. "Sorry," he offered immediately, retrieving his hand and holding both up so that she could see them. "Didn’t mean to – "

"It’s okay," Buffy sighed. "I just don’t – I don’t like to be touched. By anyone." She shivered at the admission. The people who touched her were her friends; they held her, hugged her, tried to comfort her, and they didn’t know, couldn’t know how difficult that made her existence. Touching meant feeling – and feeling was something she was trying to avoid.

"Yeah,"; he snorted. "Right. Buffy – the one thing you need right now is to be touched. And you’ve got this – wall – " His hands went out in explanation. "- between you and everything else. So nothing can. Touch you, that is. You can’t stay behind it forever. It’ll feel like forever if you do."

"Do you ever make any sense?" she asked, staring at him with sudden challenge. Actually, he was making a great deal of sense, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to hear it. There was comfort in her sense of misery. As long as she was submersed in it, she didn’t have to face the effort it cost climbing out – and since there didn’t seem to be anything to climb out for, staying submersed seemed a sensible thing to do.

"Made sense to me," he protested, looking a little hurt. Buffy frowned at him, trying to decide if she should just get up and walk away. She didn’t know him, and she certainly didn’t have to sit and share his company. But something kept her sitting there. It might have been the look. It was an utterly irresistible one – all little boy pout and wounded feelings.

"Well, nothing makes sense to me," she retorted. "And I really don’t know what you’re talking about. My glass isn’t half empty. It’s totally empty. Nothing in it. Nothing left."

There. That was the truth of it – the truth she’d shared with Spike, knowing it would pierce him to whatever a vampire had in place of a soul. She’d been in heaven, and now she was in hell – and she’d wanted him to know, because he would understand – and suffer with it. The way she suffered. The way she couldn’t hurt her friends …

The stranger sighed softly, reaching to enfold her hand with one of his own. This time she didn’t jump. She didn’t pull away, either. "That’s not true," he said. "And deep down – you know it isn’t. You never lose the Light. Once it’s touched your heart, it becomes a part of you. You were there, Buffy. No-one can ever take that away from you."

"But they did," she protested, finding a voice for the hurt that gnawed at her. "That’s exactly what they did. They thought they were doing me a favour. And I was done, and I was at peace, and I now I’m here. And it hurts," she concluded plaintively. "Living hurts, okay?"

He smiled softly, shaking his head with quiet sympathy. His hand tightened on hers – the barest squeeze and she looked up to meet his eyes. He looked back with comprehending empathy.

"Sometimes it’s meant to," he said gently. "That’s one of the ways you know that you’re alive."

She sat there for a long moment, staring at him. "You don’t understand," she said at last. "‘My best friend brought me back from the dead."

"Yeah," he grinned "That’s about how it was with me …"

She blinked.

"You?" He nodded, a happy you’d better believe it smile wreathing his lips.

"Mmhuh. Several times, actually. But that last time – well, that was – pretty intense. We were saving the world – as usual. He couldn’t hold onto me. He felt – responsible. It broke his heart. Shattered his soul. Sometimes," he confided thoughtfully, "the one that goes has the easier journey. It’s the ones we leave behind that endure the pain."

She nodded, understanding what he meant. It had been easy for her – easy to give up her life, not just because she’d known it was right, but because it had meant it was over. All the struggle and the pain, and the effort, and the need to carry on … all the things she’d come back to. The things she’d thought she’d left behind.

"I knew they were safe," she said. "I knew everything would be alright. But now everything’s so wrong. Was the hole I left behind so deep, so unbearable, that they could do this to me?"

"Probably. My best friend – well, he was meant to be something – but without me, he just couldn’t face it. It didn’t mean anything. He pretended he got over it, but he was just going through the motions really. That’s why I had to come back. Look - a part of you had to know there was something – left undone. Something you couldn’t leave behind. Because no-one leaves the Light if they don’t want to. It’s not something anyone can make you do. Not unless the Light itself casts you out – and I don’t think that was true in your case."

Not unless …

She looked at him with sudden suspicion. "How about yours?"

"Me?" He shrugged. "I walked out. I knew the risk – took it anyway."

"So what - ?"

"Happened? Well, I helped save the world again – got myself exiled for my sins. I defied the powers. Disobeyed the law." He shrugged a second time, as if it was no big deal. "There had to be some comeback for it." He grinned. "Got promoted though. And I found myself right where I wanted to be. I’ll go back - someday. When I need too …"

She heard the sudden catch in his voice. "You miss it."

"Every day. Who wouldn’t? But I belong here – and so do you. You know you do."

People need me …

She was the Slayer. She had a destiny. A destiny she thought she’d fufilled. But perhaps she hadn’t. Not yet. And Willow, and Xander, and Giles – they all needed her, as much as she’d always needed them.

"Maybe,"she answered, reluctant to admit it, however true it might be. "It’s just so hard."

He let go of her hand, giving it a comforting pat as he did so. "S’what makes it fun," he said with a wink, giving her a smile that lit up his whole face. Even his eyes were laughing – with joy, not mockery. "You’ll see. See you around?"

He was standing up to go; Buffy nearly reached to pull him back, then settled for a brave smile instead. "I might," she allowed. For some reason she felt much better than she had before – and the sun finally had a ripple of warmth behind it’s caress. "But I don’t come out much in the day. The people I work with – don’t like too much light."

He laughed. "Their loss," he said. "But you never know. My friend and I – well, we turn up where we’re needed. Take care of yourself, Buffy. You’re special."

He gave her an encouraging wave, stuck his hands in his pockets and strolled away, whistling. It wasn’t a tune she recognised, but it had a jaunty air to it. She watched him go, a part of her admiring the way he walked – so casually and yet so confidently. His easy, balanced stride suggested martial arts training, or something of that ilk. He certainly looked as if he knew how to take care of himself in a fight. When he reached the corner of the path he paused, glancing back in her direction. She gave him a little wave of her own, then pulled her hand down and look around in embarrassment. Waving at strange men in the park. Whatever would her mother say?

It was late when she finally decided to go home. She’d sat for a long time, pondering what the stranger had said, and trying to decide if she believed him or not. There had to have been something about him – something that enabled him to know who she was, and what she struggled with. But – what were the chances that she’d run into another soul brought back from death – from where she’d been? She hadn’t wanted to leave. She couldn’t imagine anyone else wanting to either.

The arrival of dusk finally stirred her. She’d known that Willow and Tara would take care of Dawn after school – and that they’d probably all go round to the magic shop to help Giles complete his stocktaking. She hadn’t thought she could face all that before – the jokes and the comments and the way Anya took everything so literally …

They try so hard when I’m around. It’s like they know I’m fragile – but they don’t know why and they don’t know what to do about it.

Buffy didn’t know what to do about it, either. But she didn’t feel quite so fragile any more –and suddenly she wanted company. To be among the living. Because that’s where she needed to be.

She hurried across the park and took the shortcut back to town – the one that ran past the old abandoned mall. Typically for Sunnydale, the place had been closed down for years – but vagrants and homeless people still used the underground car park from time to time. Other creatures too – she’d hunted vamps there on more than one occasion. And there’d been that time when someone had tried to summon a demon …

She was halfway past the car park entrance when she heard the scream. A muffled, disbelieving scream. One that came from somewhere inside the building – and which was cut off with a startled gulp.

"Screaming," she observed, pausing in the dusk shrouded shadow of the main gate. "Lot of dramatic situations start with screaming. Lot of them end that way too," she concluded, peering past the tollbooth and eyeing up the deserted slope beyond. It descended – like much of her life – steeply into the dark. Her hand dipped into her bag, confirming its contents; a handful of freshly sharpened stakes, a heavy carved crucifix, and a silver bladed dagger – the one Giles had pressed into her hands only the day before.

Just in case, he’d said, pushing his glasses up tight to his nose and looking at her in the way he did these days. With concern, affection – and a whole slew of other things, like awe and amazement and disbelief … There was something about the way Giles looked at her that made her feel better about coming back. But she’d never actually realised it until now.

"Good old Giles," she smiled, patting the bag into place at her side. With luck this would just be a couple of vamps out for an early evening meal. A little dance, a quick stake – and they’d be dust and she’d be on the way home again.

Except it wasn’t vamps.

It was a Caranth demon.

And he had something with him. Something she’d never seen before, but which she disliked immediately she saw it. It might have had something to do with all the tentacles. The ones that ended in little sucky mouths.

Or the fact that it was feeding on a fresh victim. So fresh that the poor guy was still twitching.

"Oh, yuk," she registered, carefully creeping down the slope and into the lower level of the abandoned carpark. There was a burned out vehicle shell, the inevitable pile of cardboard boxes, and a whole load of concrete pillars filling the place with static shadows; the only light came from the flicker of a small fire – which was probably the one the hobo had been warming himself at before the demon arrived.

He’d lit it right in the middle of the old painted pentacle that the would be sorcerer had left behind.

"Damn," she hissed, realising that the demon’s victim had unwittingly managed to complete a spell that she and the Scooby gang had believed they’d thwarted on a previous occasion. "Gotta start cleaning up behind us …"

She didn’t like Caranth demons. They were slimy and had long prehensile tongues – and they were smart, too. This one was wearing a suit – which looked a little incongrous on him – and he had his beast tethered on a long chain. The chain went round what was probably the thing’s neck – if things like that had necks. It had a dozen jointed legs and lots of tentacles. Half of them ended in those icky little mouths, and the rest were tipped with sharply curled claws. It also had a rough leathery skin, and was about the size of a large labrador. Which suggested that she’d not have much trouble dealing with it.

Good job I brought the knife, though …

She’d remembered that Caranths were susceptible to silver. Giles would be proud of her.

"Do you have a license for that thing?" she asked, stepping out from behind a pillar so that she could confront the demon and his pet. The Caranth turned with a hiss, hunching over and staring at her with deep red eyes.

"Hallooo,"; he carolled. "What do we have here? A vagrant? A misplaced innocent? A sweet feast for my pretty?"

"None of the above," Buffy retorted, taking a step forward. This was what she was. What she did. She didn’t think much of living right now – but slaying was in her blood, was part of her soul. Maybe she – like the stranger’s friend – was ‘just going through the motions’. But they were familiar motions – and they had a purpose. A meaning.

Because they sent fiends like this one back where they belonged.

"Hi. I’m Buffy. You’re dead."

The Caranth reared back, a little like a snake startled by sudden movement. "The Slayer? But you’re dead. Aren’t you?"

"Old news," she corrected pointedly. "Get with the program." She dipped into the bag and pulled out the knife – then tossed the bag away, so that she didn’t have to worry about it. "On second thoughts,"; she decided tersely, "I’ll put you on it."

"Bold," the demon noted, looking more amused than alarmed. "And beautiful. But no brains."His hand slid down the chain, reaching for the clip that held it in place. "Do you know what this is?"

The creature was straining at the leash – and had been ever since Buffy had stepped out of the shadows. The remains of the dead guy tumbled out of its grip, looking as if it had spent several months in a morgue, and every tentacle swung round, waving eagerly in the Slayer’s direction.

"Something that crawled out of a garbage disposal?" she suggested, looking at it with disgust. If he let it off the chain, then she’d have to kill it first. How hard could that be?

"This," he laughed, "is a soul-eater. Know what that means? No – don’t suppose you do. It takes a thousand years to nurture as fine a specimen as this. But it’s worth it." His eyes flashed with sudden fire. "Vampires may drink blood and corrupt the soul of their victims – but the soul-eater devours the very essence of the soul itself. It craves the richness of life, the depth of existence and by absorbing it, quiets the hunger that fuels its own." The demon glanced down, at where the creature hissed and skittered, trying to escape the limits of the chain. "Once a year I let it out to feed – and feed until it is small enough to lock away again. It hasn’t eaten much today. Pickings were slim."

Buffy frowned at him. "I’m not here for a biology lesson," she said. "You intending to talk all night? Because you’ll be doing it without a head."

The soul-eater lunged forward and she bounced back, feeling the whistle of claws cut the air just in front of her. Was she seeing things – or was it really getting larger?

The Caranth unrolled his tongue, and then rolled it back up with a flick of pleasure. "I’ll talk as long as I like. You won’t be around to stop me. The soul-eater eats souls. Devours them. Digests them. Destroys them utterly. Nothing left. And once it has a scent – it won’t stop until it’s taken every last drop."

Oh-oh.

Buffy’s mouth went dry. He might have been exaggerating, but on the other hand …

Nothing left? Nothing at all?

She hadn’t exactly been taking this encounter seriously until now. It had all seemed old hat and too routine for words. A demon a day, that sort of stuff. After all, she no longer had any fear of death. Knowing what she knew – however dimly, however disjointedly – the prospect of dying, of leaving this world and moving to the next, was one that she’d probably welcome. Provided that it didn’t hurt too much. But the Caranth wasn’t talking about death. He was talking about dissolution. About being reduced to nothing, without hope of reprieve, without any chance of moving to a better place.

Ever.

"Maybe I’ll kill it first," she said, suppressing a sudden shiver. Was it one of fear – or desire? The Caranth grinned.

"You can try," he said – and unhooked the chain.