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plex
by Spyke Raven
Disclaimer: Joss Whedon created them. I play with them.
Summary: Imagine a universe where Buffy Summers never existed. There have been...changes.
Rating: R to NC-17
Warning: Language, m/m sexual interaction. Lots of weird science.
Notes: -plex
Function: noun combining form
In response to Lar's Improv challenge supposed to be set in the Wishverse. I've extrapolated.
Since this is an AU, cut me some slack, huh.
---
Ist -plex: Memory
---
The boy was too thin. All angles, planes and too-white flesh huddling in her arms as she rocked him uncertainly. Shivering from delayed shock or too little to eat.
"Sh," she whispered, trying to convey strength. "Ssh... ssh."
The child trembled, but she could feel him relax.
Gradually the shivers lessened and after a while his breathing evened out.
She let him slip back onto the mattress. Covered him carefully and touched a light finger to his forehead.
"Mm..." He turned into her touch and she drew back, unsure. Waited for another minute before leaving him for the silence of the front room and the comfort of a cigarette.
She drew in smoke carefully, in order to see into the future of the five year old on her bed.
The future was brief and to the point. And harsh. And cruel.
Just like the past.
Maggie clamped her teeth around her cigarette and sucked in *hard *.
The boy was far too thin.
---
Somewhere hot dusty and sunburnt. A road and a car on it, the couple inside playing the game.
"Where are we coming from?" asked the woman.
"Somewhere?"
"Where are we going to?"
"Anywhere. Elsewhere?"
Maggie smiled, a quick compression of lips. Riley grinned back with all the resilience of his ten years.
She took a deep breath, Riley's cue to begin listening. Glanced at him once to make sure he was paying attention.
He was. Good.
"Hansville; population 10 000. Thirty percent work the outlying farmlands. Two main streets, one post-office and three churches." She paused. "Three graveyards."
Riley nodded, filing this away.
"Questions?"
The same one as always. "Military?"
She nodded approval. "A weather base twenty-five miles out of town."
Weather base. They'd have computers. "SETI?"
"No. Meteorological installation." She didn't stress the words, but Riley knew she'd meant to.
Oh. "Then they're near."
"Close enough."
"Friends?"
She shot him a quick look. "Possibly. Why are we going to Hansville?"
He thought about this, but not carefully. "To...learn?"
She took her hand off the wheel long enough to slap him lightly. "Again. Why are we going there?"
"Oh." Riley rubbed his cheek thoughtfully. "Because..."
"Yes?" Maggie prodded.
"No reason. I don't know?"
Maggie smiled. "Yes. So if anyone asks you?"
He shrugged. "I tell them to ask my mother."
"Good."
They drove on for a while.
"Maggie?"
She raised her eyebrows and he amended it. "Mom. Will we be staying?"
She tapped the steering wheel and asked him instead. "Where did we come from?"
Oh.
He bit down on disappointment. "Somewhere."
"Where are we going?"
"Elsewhere."
"Who are you?" she asked him softly. He breathed in and out for a while in the calming rhythms she'd taught him, thinking this over before answering carefully.
"Riley Walsh."
She nodded and touched his cheek with a finger. They kept driving, Riley asking no more questions.
Instead they played plant bingo. Riley knew thirteen different kinds of thorny scrub and by the time they reached Hansville, had learned to recognise another three.
Maggie won anyway.
---
They always chose towns with large congregations, where home schooling would be tolerated and churches widespread. Places with a sizeable population, where their coming and eventual going would not be overly remarked on.
The last town had been a little too small, but Maggie had needed to make contact with an old friend.
It was rude to eavesdrop, but Riley hid in the kitchen to listen anyway.
The man who'd come to see Maggie - Mom - had been old. Almost forty, Riley guessed. He'd brought a reasonably big cardboard box with him; then hung around even though she'd not offered him anything to drink.
Riley stationed himself in the kitchen just in case she needed him to get ice or glasses. Maggie liked him to be useful.
"Captain Walsh."
"Dr.," she corrected him. "I resigned, remember?"
"Captain," he stressed. "Your resignation has not been - officially -accepted."
She barked with laughter and Riley bet she was clamping her teeth together. Maggie liked to smoke, but pretended she was kicking the habit.
"Engelman, are you going to tell on me?"
"Maggie," the man pleaded. "This is madness. We need you."
"You can't have me, Engelman." A minute of silence. "Are you going to tell on me?"
"Maggie!" the man sounded shocked.
She snorted. "Please."
Five minutes later, Engelman gave in.
"Two days, Maggie. I can give you two days, but then I have to make a report."
"Two days." Maggie sounded like she was chewing the words. "What about these?"
"I'll get them written off as damaged. The department can afford it. Maggie -"
"Hubert. Thank you. I really do appreciate this."
Engelman left soon after. Riley was unsure, but he thought Maggie kissed him goodbye.
When he thought it was safe to go in, she was standing in the living room, hands on her hips, looking at a very strange array of black and silver boxes.
"When I tell you to go to your room Riley boy, I expect you to stay there."
"You didn't tell me to go to my room," he reminded her meekly.
She turned to look at him, her eyes amused, her face stern. "Next time. It's an order."
"Yes'm." He tried very hard not to look at the boxes and was rewarded by the light touch of her index finger on his cheek.
"Riley boy, I tell you everything you need to know."
He swallowed. "Yes'm."
She tapped his cheek lightly. "Get packing, soldier. We're going elsewhere."
'Going elsewhere' meant they had to leave now, quickly and quietly, leaving no traces behind.
Compared to some of the places elsewhere had been, Hansville population10 000 didn't sound all that bad.
Maybe this time Riley'd be allowed to make some friends.
---
"Don't touch that," she said.
Riley drew his hand back immediately.
"Come and help me with this," she tugged at one of the boxes loaded into the back of the van. Together they managed to lift it the required twenty metres to the barn. Riley thought of the fifteen other boxes still to be unloaded with some dismay.
"That was the heaviest," Maggie laughed at his adroit change of expression. "Here," she tossed him the measuring tape and a stick of chalk. "You can start with the parabolic defences."
Full of anxious pride, Riley measured the barn and started drawing the necessary hexagrams while Maggie oofed and huffed her way through the unloading. He'd finished the preliminary perimeter before all the boxes were in and watched Maggie carefully unload the bags he wasn't supposed to touch.
Maggie went over his circles and then began the addenda. He watched carefully, crossing his fingers to make his wish come true.
No one would follow them. They'd be staying here a good long time.
"Woof." She dropped the chalk and stared at the sea of diagrams, tilting her head this way and that to ascertain their accuracy. Riley waited for the word.
She smiled, happy.
"Bath time, boy," and punched him lightly on the shoulder.
They locked the barn door and went inside the house to begin the long process of making the house habitable.
Two bathrooms and both had running water. Riley hoped they'd be staying a very long time.
---
Lessons after dinner. There were always lessons after dinner.
Riley hated this.
"Plex."
He concentrated. "Figure of power. Primary... trans... trans-descending -"
"Transcending. Continue."
"...transcending conjunction." He touched his index finger and thumb to form the ouroborous.
Maggie frowned. "Meaning?"
"We use it to join stuff. To... to make new words."
She smiled and he exhaled as she mimicked his gesture. "The ouroborous. Snake that bites its own tail. Found in chemical structures; benzene, alkylations."
Maggie relaxed her thumb slightly, letting the circle open. "Now. Open. Next form?"
"Duplex."
"Explain."
"Two. Joined."
"Example?"
"The double helix." He used his second finger entwined to demonstrate.
Full lecture mode. "Yes. The helix. Constantly seen in biological, chemical and mathematical structures. The helix has power. Tell me why."
"Because... it's the next order of plex. It's open. Infinite conjunctions."
"Yes. And no. Not infinite. You see..."
Two hours later, Riley was exhausted. And Maggie had only begun explaining why the complicated diagrams on the barn floor would keep them safe from anything short of a direct nuclear attack.
"As long as you remember this. Never invite anybody in."
Because invitations broke the binding spell - or quantum boundary, like Maggie liked to call it.
An invitation had got his parents killed. He'd been four and in crche, like all the kids whose parents had volunteered for the project, so he hadn't been home.
Maggie never told him that. He'd just remembered it one day.
Yesterday he'd calculated that they'd been in hiding for five years and 41 days. More than half his life had been spent running around.
He wondered what it would feel like to actually settle down in one place. To have a mom who worked at a normal job and to come home to cookies and birthday parties with lots of kids his own age.
Maggie sighed and ruffled his hair, breaking the reverie.
"Bed, soldier," she said. Maggie nearly always knew what he was thinking.
He kissed her goodnight before going to his room and undressing quickly.
Maggie always waited till he turned off his light before lighting her nightly cigarette.
---
Riley ran. He ran in ever widening concentric circles, keeping the barn at the centre.
He liked to run in the early mornings. He liked it best when Maggie ran with him, but she was normally busy.
"Riley boy!"
He slowed down and retraced his path, finally jogging in front of Maggie, who shaded her eyes and smiled at him.
"Here," she tossed him heavy gloves. "Put those on."
He did and squinted as they entered the barn, the sudden dark making his eyes hurt.
Maggie spun around and kicked at him, hard. He ducked easily and rolled to catch her ankles and flip her over, but she was too fast for him.
Foot in his stomach and the stars blanked him out.
When he awoke she was squatting before him, teeth champing on her imaginary cigarette.
"You know the rules, boy. An hour with the bag."
He got up slowly, trying not to wince.
It didn't work. Maggie sighed.
"Hour and a half."
He worked at the bag, only stopping to wipe sweaty bangs from his forehead. Maggie watched and took notes.
An hour into training she stopped him and gave him a bottle of water, making sure he drank very slowly. Used a towel to mop his head.
Riley closed his eyes and let himself enjoy this.
Maggie stroked a curl of hair between thumb and forefinger.
"Haircut time. What do you think?"
Riley nodded. He liked it when Maggie cut his hair.
---
"The rarity and essential fragility of the human condition is our conflicting reliance on each other. We need other people around, but we also assume a need to be self-sufficient." Maggie gave him that sideways look she used when she wanted to be certain he was paying attention. "What am I saying?"
He thought. "We need groceries."
She nodded. "And."
"And... we're going to have visitors?"
Quick half-smile. "Maybe. Who?"
They'd been here a week setting up house and falling into a routine. "Um. Neighbours?"
"Good. Who are you?"
"Riley Walsh."
"Where do you come from?"
"Iowa."
"Why are we here?"
He shrugged. "Dunno."
A real smile this time. She tossed him the keys.
"Try not to crash us, and you can drive maybe partway."
Maggie let him drive an entire mile. They picked up groceries and saw fifty gazillion people, but hardly anyone asked them any questions. Hansville, population 10 000 liked to mind its own business.
Riley squelched an irrational surge of disappointment. It was safer this way.
---
Maggie's contact at the base waited three months before coming to meet her. By that time Riley had learned how to put the seismograph together and take reasonably accurate readings. He was working on a frequency chart when Captain Horscht showed up.
"Is your mother at home?"
Riley left her standing on the porch while he went out back to find Maggie.
"Company."
Maggie locked the door very carefully before following him inside.
"Ah. Captain -?"
"Horscht, ma'am."
"Captain Horscht. Come in."
"Thank you." The woman didn't look at all angry to be kept waiting. "It's an honour, Dr. Walsh."
Maggie smiled and told Riley to go fix lemonade.
When he returned with three glasses, the visitor had her eyes closed and lips pursed in consideration. Maggie took a glass and waved him to the wall, finger to her lips. Riley went, taking his glass with him.
Horscht opened her eyes. "We're a meteorological installation, Dr. Walsh. Biologicals aren't really my field..."
Maggie just waited.
Horscht shook her head. "I can let you have the serotonin. Even the cholinesterase. But can you promise me -"
"No." Maggie cut in sharply. "No, captain, I can't promise you anything. Not a thing."
The captain exhaled. "Then what do you want?"
"Three things." Maggie ticked them off. "A blind eye for now. A warning for later. And a six month supply of the enzymes you mentioned."
"Six months." Horscht's brow was furrowed.
Maggie nodded. "By then the body should begin producing its own boosters."
Horscht's eyes flickered involuntarily to Riley standing in the corner and quietly drinking his lemonade.
"What if it doesn't?"
"Get me what I need, Captain, and we can call it even."
"Even." Horscht snorted. "I can't promise you six months. I can supply the biologicals, but I can't promise you six months."
Maggie shrugged. "Just warn me as soon as you can."
Horscht sighed and got up. "May I?"
Maggie nodded and Riley came forward to shake hands with the woman.
"I knew Andrew Finn," Horscht said softly. "He was a very brave man." She pressed his hand. "And so is his son."
Riley looked at her solemnly, but couldn't think of anything to say.
Horscht never visited them again. But the supplies must have turned up, because there was an extra freezer in the house that Riley was specifically told never to touch.
They spent exactly seven months in Hansville before Maggie decided they had to move elsewhere again.
Riley's back was hurting pretty badly by then. He'd put on height and learnt how to drive the van without crashing it. He'd pass for thirteen anywhere, which, Maggie said, was good for their cover.
Cover or not, the height was useful. Riley was eleven years old and girls were starting to look pretty good.
Some of them even looked back at him.
---
Spin. Kick. Thrust. Down.
Crash!
"Again."
Spin. Thrust. Kick. Down.
"Again."
Spin. Thrust. Kick Spin. Kick. Down. Thrust.
Maggie clicked the stopwatch. Riley looked up, panting, from his position on the floor. Four dummies lay whirring softly, their mechanical claws kicking.
The last one had nearly had him. Maggie frowned.
"Sixty-five seconds."
Yeesh. Riley grimaced and got up from his position.
"Again," Maggie started, and Riley groaned.
"Maggie. Please. A break?"
Her voice was hard as she answered. "You're on the street. Three hostiles step in from an alley. Another two coming up fast. Maybe two, maximum three minutes behind. What do you do?"
Riley thought. "I get at least fifty seconds between attacks. I use that to rest."
Quick flash of grin. Maggie tamped it down immediately and set her features. Clicked the stopwatch.
"Again."
Riley sighed and crouched into the starting kata.
The fifth robot hit him from behind and he went down.
The stopwatch clicked.
"You're dead, boy."
He refused to nod.
I know. I know.
---
They'd been staying put for the longest time in this town - nearly a year! - and Riley was attending junior high. Maggie wanted him to interact with people his own age, learn how the normal part of the world lived. Something about being able to fit in anywhere. All part of the cover. But secretly, he liked to pretend that the cover was real, that Maggie was really just an ordinary Mom who worked at the hospital and would bawl him out if he didn't do well in school.
Actually, she never bawled him out for grades less than a B+. Just set him an extra hour of 'normal' tuition in addition to the real studies.
Maggie told him once. "You know more than any child your age. If you get low grades, it's because you're bored." She'd paused significantly. "When you get bored - you die."
He'd taken the point about the training, and made sure his grades were up. But not too high. After all, wouldn't do to attract attention.
Then he'd tried out for athletics and made the school team. Suddenly Tricia and her girlfriends from the junior squad were giggling at him when he passed their lockers.
It felt nice. It was more than nice.
Riley felt great. He nuked the dummies in practice and perfected a baton twirl with his weapon.
Looking back that was probably what started it all.
Maggie told him it was time they went live.
---
"This isn't a game."
He repressed the urge to roll his eyes. Maggie noticed and caught his chin in her hand, jerking his head around so fast it spun.
"This. Is not. A game." She said between clenched teeth. "Seventy percent of these people are regular churchgoers. Southern Baptist churchgoers with crosses around their necks and firm beliefs in the powers of darkness. That still leaves thirty percent vulnerable to hostiles." She shook his head. "What's thirty percent of twenty thousand?"
"Six thousand."
"Six thousand." One last jerk and she let him go. "Think about that, mister. Six thousand people depending on someone like you."
He suited up in silence. She watched him like a hawk.
"Riley." Her voice was soft. He wasn't a kid, but he couldn't look up at her.
"Riley-boy. Listen to me. This is the safest place for you to learn what you've got to." When she cupped his face in both hands he made himself look at her. "Okay, soldier? This is the safest place for you to be right now. But there will be other places. Not so safe. You hear me?"
"Yes'm." He nodded and she pressed a quick kiss to his forehead.
"Good. Let's go."
It wasn't a game. Riley figured it out for himself within the first hour.
---
The first three nights they just watched from the shadows, marking trails and following patterns.
The hostiles followed pretty standard MOs. Clubs. Bars. Discos. Somewhere relatively crowded, with dark alleys behind.
Extract. Devour. Leave body for scavengers.
There were scavengers, but Riley was throwing up too hard to identify the species.
Later Maggie told him there were three common urban sub-species. She named possible blind spots in their methods.
Dry throated, Riley paid attention. This wasn't a game.
Fourth night he made his first kill. The hostile was bloated and slow after feeding. Even then it took Riley three tries and a badly scratched arm.
Maggie bandaged his arm and told him that in a year's time he might be able to graduate to killing them before they got to their victims. He took it as the challenge it was, and threw himself into his training.
Soon they were up to a kill a week.
The nightmares started.
---
Riley lost weight and appetite. His skin grew paler and there were dark circles under his eyes.
His grades went down to straight Bs, but Maggie didn't assign him any extra homework. They still patrolled three nights a week. Riley averaged 2 kills per night. He resigned from track and avoided Tricia when she caught his eye. Pretty soon, though, she started avoiding him.
Three months after going live, Maggie announced that they were moving.
Riley was only too glad.
---
The nightmares didn't stop in the next town, or the next, but he began reacting less. They were real. So was he. The only way to stop them happening was to kill the monsters first.
One night Riley woke up in Maggie's bed. He must've sleepwalked into the safety of her arms.
It embarrassed him and he left immediately.
They never spoke of it, but sometimes he knew Maggie would come in to watch him sleep.
He wasn't sure how he felt about that. Neither, it seemed, was she.
They kept moving. Never stayed anywhere more than a few months. Enough to scope out the hostiles and leave a few memories. Hit hard. Hit fast. Leave immediately.
Riley knew it was because of him. He was still too young, vulnerable to attack.
Maggie started him on serotonin again. He put on muscle and learnt how to design encryption software.
Time passed. Riley was thirteen and decided to fall in love.
Riley had his first kiss. Maggie had her first heart attack. The two events were not even connected. But Riley always felt they had been.
---
Graham was seventeen and had his own car. Riley could pass for sixteen and he'd never bothered to correct the guy with the car. The open roof and cheap twelve-packs of beer were too perfect to lose.
Most nights they just parked on a hill overlooking the city and sprawled on a rug in front of the car, clasping cans and talking crap.
"What d'you want to do with your life?"
Graham burped. Riley hit him.
"Jerk."
"Good idea," he leered, wincing when Riley hit him again. "Watch the shoulder, man."
"Huh." Riley pretended to be wringing his hand in pain. "Mr. T-bone."
Graham took another swig of beer. "What's with the philosophy, dude?"
Riley shrugged. "Dunno. Just wondering, I guess."
"Aaah...let me guess. Your old lady's giving you a hard time about the SATs." Graham punched his shoulder. "Fear not, son. They're a breeze."
"They are?" SATs. Scholastic Aptitude Tests. Yes, he'd have to pass them to get into a college somewhere. Assuming they ever settled down long enough for him to take them.
SATs were on the list of normal things not allowed for Riley Finn-Walsh. Like girls, and cars and a job at Burger King.
"Yep. A breeze." Graham snorted. "I passed them."
"Oh," wondering what this meant.
"Pass me a beer." Riley did, and Graham lay back, using the extra can to cool his forehead. "Did pretty ok," he said meditatively. "I'll be out of here, come July."
July. Was that three months away?
Riley couldn't think.
"Ri? Rye-boy?"
"Yea..." he got up on one elbow and turned to face Graham, who was looking at him with laughing eyes and the strangest expression.
Riley swallowed.
"So," said Graham, still with that half-teasing, half-serious expression. "You'll miss me."
Not trusting himself to speak, Riley smiled a little.
"Aw, Rye-boy..."
The rest of the words were swallowed up in a warm, wet, beer flavoured kiss. After a while Riley forgot to worry about where to fit his nose and just let Graham lead.
Beer spilled from the open cans into the grass. For once it didn't matter.
When he finally got home, Maggie was at her computer working on some sort of display. She looked up to smile at him. Riley smiled back, a little sheepishly and left her to it.
That night he started doing his own laundry. Maggie was kind enough not to mention it, but he couldn't help blushing slightly anyway.
It was the best time of his life.
---
Two days after the first kiss, Graham and he drove up to the same spot and just hung around, sitting on the hood of the car, pretending to drink beer and casually bumping their legs together. Riley gave in first.
"Screw this," and turned to find Graham already with the program, lips slightly parted, eyes dancing.
This kiss was nicer. Longer, a little deeper. When Graham pulled away, Riley found himself licking his lips and wanting to fall in again.
He did.
---
Maggie didn't tell him about the heart attack. She'd been at work when the shooting pains hit her side and so just had to take the elevator down to cardio.
She was diagnosed with a congenital murmur, exacerbated by stress. Riley found out because the test results had been on top of the seismographs for the week. As if she wanted him to be prepared, but wasn't really up to discussing it. So he didn't push it, and neither did she.
He stopped seeing Graham for a while though and began spending more time at home. Helping with the charts, doing extra time in the practice room. Learning how to cook lasagne.
After three days of this Maggie practically threw him out of the house and into the arms of his boyfriend. It would be years before he'd realise just how much that had cost her to do.
The essential fragility of our human condition.
The nightmares were getting more focussed.
---
They'd been moving for nearly two years now, north, south, east, random directions and crazy twisting circles, never staying more than a month in any place, living out of motels and the van, hitting and running with a vengeance that left Riley breathless. Graham was a distant memory. Maggie was on regular nitro-glycerine and rarely followed him on patrols. For a while they'd rigged up some sort of transmitter system, but it only worked as long as Riley was within a 65-degree arc-triangle from the responder. He became accustomed to the sensation of being alone.
He didn't quite like it. Didn't quite like being away from her that much. It was as if they were running out of time for something, but he wasn't sure what it could be. All he knew was that each night they travelled, the nightmares grew more potent, like giant jigsaw pieces that only needed to be fitted together for the full picture.
Riley didn't have the key. But he was the son of a scientist. He worked at it. He began tracing maps of their travels, trying to find a connection, a pattern that would explain why they kept running. Where they could be running to.
He accepted that they were running from the military. Maggie had stopped making contact with her friends inside once she'd got the pocket spectral analyser from Captain Horscht, relying on regular jobs at hospitals and clinics to supply the rest of what they needed. Running from was accepted. But he realised there must be a running to. Otherwise what was the point of all this?
He'd learned by now not to openly challenge Maggie. She told him what he must absolutely know and left the rest to inference. Implying of course, that if he couldn't find out, he didn't deserve to know.
When he finally allowed himself to see it, he felt really, really stupid. Even for a second, betrayed, before realising how dumb that was.
At least it explained why Maggie never told him much, just let him work things out for himself. Them that asked no questions wouldn't be told lies.
Riley knew Maggie well enough to understand she had her own sense of honour. She wouldn't lie to him. She loved him. She always had.
He realised how much he loved her.
---
Maggie was at the seismograph patterning disturbances when he came up to her with the maps.
"Ouroborous," he said, indicating the routes he'd traced. "Duplex. Double helix. We've back-tracked, gone in circles, but always in plex."
Riley paused, gauging her reaction.
"We're moving here. Towards... a geocentric node."
Maggie nodded.
Riley paused. "Sunnydale? Is that it?"
She leaned back from the computer and showed him the leylines. "They've always originated here. All major disturbances can be traced to this point." Rested a finger on the tiny dot that marked their destination. "What do you see?"
They exchanged places, Riley sitting down on the chair to study the graphs.
"Mm. Definitely a crack of some sort. Thermal vent?"
"Yes. The fissure probably extends down through the lithosphere. The energy is dissipated by hostiles rather than earthquakes." Maggie grimaced. "Probably a good thing for the human residents."
Probably. Not. Riley looked at the graphs.
Snakes bit their own tails and helices stretched out into looping infinity. He let his eyes lose focus, following the patterns rather than the curves...
There.
He leaned forward. "Something big... is about to happen." Tapped the Sunnydale dot. "Something really big. Giant. Here."
Maggie nodded, eyes bright, following the loops.
"And you think we can stop it?" His mouth was dry, remembering old scratches on his arm and a poison that had hissed and swelled in the cuts.
Maggie shook her head. No.
"But we have to try."
---
That night his arm hurt so badly that he crawled into her bed, fully awake and conscious. She stiffened slightly, but didn't push him away.
Trying to be strong for both of them, Riley put his good arm around her, holding on as they slept.
---
He didn't ask questions, but she told him the answers anyway.
"The military screwed us."
He'd taken over the job of charting their courses. Maggie still read the seismographs, following line after blue line as the printer spewed them out.
Riley had envied her the ability to multi-task. Now he realised that mortality cleanses the mind.
"There were five of us. Engelman, your parents, myself and Horscht's father." She stencilled a red line through three seemingly random groups. "We were told that this would be the most ambitious task ever to be undertaken by any force on the earth. That we were honest-to-God truly making war on the forces of darkness."
Maggie threw the ball straight at him. "What do you think?"
Riley blinked and tried to be truthful. "I've seen demons. You taught me five-dimensional maths. I think it depends on definition."
She barked laughter. "Nice. Well, we were the ultimate force for good. For peace, love and truthfulness. We developed the cream of nano-biotechnology. Chip implants that made hostiles unable to function against any human being." She spread her arms crucifix wide. "Make love, not war."
"The chips worked."
"The chips worked. But."
Riley waited, half-poised to get a tablet between her lips if her breathing didn't stabilise.
Fortunately it did, but she took a tablet anyway.
"The bastards sold us out. Colonel McNamara and General Ward. They were supposed to be our official liaisons with the people on top. They supplied us with hostiles and money."
Maggie paused and looked at her notes, as if seeing them for the first time. Riley had to lean in when he realised she was still speaking.
"They wanted armies, Riley boy. They wanted obedient soldiers who could be trusted not to harm civilians in peacetime, but to work large-scale decimation on selected populations."
"Your parents had the job of coming up with the discriminatory chip."
He breathed a little too loudly. She lifted her head then and looked him straight in the eye.
"Riley. You may not be able to understand this, but they were good people."
He held her gaze and searched it for the truth.
"They were good people who were horrified at what they'd had to do. At what they created. You were their chance... their hope of redemption." She swallowed and looked away, throat working as though she were fighting to say or not say something.
Riley waited, then let it drop. Maggie had never lied to him yet.
An hour later they were on their way south.
---
"I'm sorry," she said once. Riley glanced at her - he drove now, more often than not.
"Don't be."
She smiled, a quick flash. Maggie-grins. They still made his heart light.
"So where are we going?"
He fell into the rhythm. "Somewhere."
She looked at him startled, then punched his shoulder.
"Idiot. No, really. Where?"
He slowed down to let an SUV overtake. "South by south-east. Following the arc you came up with on Thursday."
"Mm." She tapped her nails against the window frame. "How're you feeling?"
His brow furrowed. "I'm good."
Tap-tap-tap.
"You need to balance the cholinesterase and serotonin intakes," she said softly. "By the time you're twenty, you'll probably be needing super-oxide dismutases to keep your blood content human."
He nodded, eyes on the road.
"And -"
"Maggie. It's alright." Riley exhaled and let a short grin quirk the sides of his mouth. "I've read your notes."
After a while she grinned.
"What, all of them?"
"All." He said seriously.
They were quiet for the rest of the drive, Maggie's hand resting near enough to touch his thigh.
They reached Bellevue by sundown.
---
Money was getting tight. They shared a motel room.
"There's a man you'll need to meet," Maggie tossed Riley a flat black compendium. He opened it, wincing at the tiny printing.
"His name is Rupert Giles. He's... probably the best guide you could have." After, she left the word unspoken.
Riley didn't think. He just said.
"Maggie, no -"
"Yes."
She spoke flatly and reached involuntarily inside her pocket for a cigarette. It was in her mouth and lit before she realised and took it out. Asked him wryly, "Mind if I smoke?"
Somehow that broke the tension, and they collapsed on the bed, laughing hysterically.
Maggie puffed on her cigarette. "God that feels good." She pointed a stern finger at Riley. "If you even so much as think of smoking-"
"No ma'am."
"Good boy. Well. Rupert Giles. I've read his publications. He's into the mystical side, but where you're going, that can only be an advantage."
Riley peered at the words.
"Watcher of the Hell mouth. What is this?"
Maggie smiled. "You could say I'm a Watcher. Like you could call a fissure into the core a Hell mouth or boundary lines quantum bindings. At a certain level it all blurs."
She dropped the cigarette into the ashtray on the night table and ruffled his hair.
"You're a good boy, Riley Finn."
"Walsh," he corrected and kissed her quickly on the forehead.
They lay chastely, side-by-side, hands near each other but not touching. Then -
"Walsh," agreed Maggie, voice thickening and gripped his hand roughly. Once, twice.
Riley turned off the lights and the two of them slept.
Next morning Maggie didn't wake up.
---
Her body was thin, all angles and planes in his arms as he arranged her carefully in her best dress and shoes.
The goodbye kiss was fragile on her paper-thin skin that seemed ready to split open with the dead weight of her bones. He kissed her forehead once for luck, whispering one word into her ear that she could take on her journey anywhere elsewhere.
Keep it simple, she'd asked him and he did his best to honour the request. He gave her a desert burial under the hot sun, a grave marked only by a cairn of stones and the death offering of her last pack of cigarettes.
He'd promised her he wouldn't smoke. He didn't once cry. Only clenched his fingers twice - plex, duplex, for luck and infinite conjunctions that would lead him correctly from here to somewhere.
Stones piled atop his mother's grave, Riley Finn/Walsh got into his car and drove away without looking back.
Moving, like always, from somewhere to elsewhere. Past to future. Anywhere, elsewhere.
~ End Memory.
---
Next conjunction: Dewdrop 7.
---
2nd -plex: Dewdrop 7. Plink-plink-plunk to Plink-plink-plonk.
"C-E-A."
Plunka-plunka-plunka-plink.
"D-E-F sharp -G -"
"Dude," Oz laughs softly, sweeping his fingers into the required rhythm. "I have your number."
"Aah yess..." and Larry leans back, eyes closed, fingers tapping out the rhythm of 'Dewdrop 7'. Also known as his favourite song. Their special song that Oz insists he co-authored.
"I have the musical talent of a blocked fart, man," he says, like he always does. And Oz grins, like always.
"You can play a crossbow, you can write music."
"Mmm..."
But no crossbows tonight. The town is still, four days before Walpurgis, so Giles took Ben and Nancy on patrol and nothing for the partners to do but lie on the roof and watch the pretty night sky.
Which reminds Larry that though the house is bounded, it's still kind of stupid to be on the roof near so many trees...
Catching the mood change, Oz smiles and tries a little riff on the wild side. Larry's eyes snap open.
"Aw, man, you're ruining it."
"No, see," demonstrating, "you can go straight back."
"Mm..." Larry follows the movement of Oz's sparkly nails, unconsciously licking his lips as they move from C to E and back again.
"Dude?"
"Yea," Larry says, hushed. "Oz, man. You're ruining your nails."
Oz stops playing and lifts a hand for inspection.
"Come inside," urges the larger boy softly. "Come on in and let me paint 'em for you."
Oz grins and leans forward, touching his forehead to Larry's.
Larry's smile widens. Oz's eyes narrow in mischief.
Plinka-plinka-plink!
"Shit!" startled, Larry jumps back.
"Whoa, man," Oz steadies him with a hand. A moment when all hangs in precarious balance, then some confused way, they're stable again.
Larry rests a hand on Oz's shoulder.
"You are so full of shit, man," whispering it straight into the guitarist's ears.
Oz quirks an eyebrow and whispers back. Larry's eyes squeeze shut like he can't believe his luck.
"Inside," he orders.
Grinning companionably, they go in.
---
Larry's room, Larry's bed. Larry lying face down, shirt off, pants unzipped and half off, cock rubbing mercilessly into cotton sheets while Oz presses naked kisses to the muscles of his shoulders.
"Do that again," Larry groans.
"This?" Oz rakes freshly painted nails lightly against tanned skin. "You have a great torso, man. Should sun it more often."
"Sun... huh...? Jesus!" Arching explosively as Oz positions himself accurately for a thrust against the crease of Larry's ass.
"Just me," Oz chuckles, rubbing heated denim on salt-tangy skin. "Just me," whispering into Larry's ear and sliding a hand down under his belly to find and touch -
"SHIT!"
- exactly there.
"Oz, Oz," Larry's panting now, back heaving in great gasps. "You gotta let me up here. I'm dying, man."
"Ssh." A kiss to Larry's cheek. A wink and a breath that fans his eyelashes. "Remember your Mom."
"She's out! I don't care! Let me up !"
"Nuh-uh," rubbing suggestively again. "Like it this way."
"I'll suck you," Larry offers.
Oz hesitates.
"I'll take you in my hand and stroke you the way you like. I'll let you fuck my mouth. I'll kiss your ass."
"Can I kiss yours?"
"Whatever man," Larry murmurs, then Mr. Brain meets up with Mr. Ear. "Oz, no, wait!" he yelps, but too late, because the guitarist is easing his pants down oh-so-tortuously-slowly, pausing in tandem to grab handfuls of Larry's ass.
"Mm," kneading with what is almost a purr. "Nice." He bends down and kisses him lightly, taking a mouthful of flesh and tugging at it.
"OZ! Beard burn!"
"Sorry." Completely unrepentant, he nuzzles Larry with his nose.
"C'mon man, that's gross."
"I like it," but in deference to his partner, kisses his way upwards again, his tongue taking little licks and swirls of hair, teasing them into sensitivity.
"Feel that?" Oz whispers.
Larry does, and indicates it with a wiggle of his butt. Oz grins and moves carefully, fitting himself into the hollow of Larry's back, legs atop legs, denim abrading skin.
He moves experimentally and groans.
"Shit, yea," Larry agrees.
"Mm," turning his head into the crook of Larry's neck, offering himself for a kiss.
Larry's willing enough, turning open mouthed and eager lipped, trying to tone it down, not to devour the man who's just there for the taking.
Oz pushes against him, cock against ass and Larry jerks, feeling it.
"Mmff,"
Tongue is slippery and not quite like his own. Rough and remnants of pizza and coke. Oz doesn't drink beer and his breath is comparatively sweet. For a second Larry wishes he'd eaten a mint himself, but Oz isn't complaining, the guitar-roughed pads of his fingers digging into Larry's skin, off-setting texture with prickliness.
"mmm..."
and Oz smooths out the lines in Larry's cheeks and forehead and massages his scalp, pulling him in further. He's slipping off now, too small to stay on top and kiss, but that's totally ok, because his cock is digging into Larry's hip and that's just enough incentive for Larry to twist and turn and *align* their cocks
"FUCK!"
He yells because denim has met flesh and the combination of rough and hypersensitivity pushes him so way back down the orgasm ladder it isn't funny.
They hold off at arms length, waiting to recover. When the agonizing tremors have faded slightly Larry looks up into Oz's slightly worried face and grins shakily.
"You owe me for that, man."
Oz tilts his head, waiting.
Larry gestures. "Take that off. Take it all off."
And watches in happy stupefaction as Oz complies.
"Mm..."
This is nicer, Larry thinks, Oz plastered to his chest, slightly sweaty, which is good, because they can move nice and slow, take it hot, take it long, take it dee-eep...
Breath hitches as Oz raises his head.
"You said something about sucking me?"
Lost for breath, Larry grins. "You bitch. You ... you bitch!" Takes Oz's hand and guides it down, sliding down his chest, slicking it on the way till it reaches his cock, which is still sensitive and a little painful.
"You ," rubbing lightly for emphasis and illustrating with gasps, "You did that to me,"
Oz's smile is gentle against his nipple, sucking lightly.
"Shit. Yea. That... you did that," focussing on the words. "You. Owe me."
"I reciprocate," Oz murmurs, letting his fingers ghost over the head of Larry's cock. "Reci-pro-city."
"God, yes," Oz is certainly a pro, jerking him off carefully. "Ow! No, wait."
Damn. Still sensitive. So he stills Oz and presses a kiss to the top of his head. "Ok, fine. You get your wish."
"Mmf," as they kiss lightly, lips touching lips, tongue only coming out for a second to caress. Rearranging so Oz is below and for a dizzying second, Larry is on top, bracing himself with hands on either side of Oz's chest, kissing lower and deeper, sucking in tongue and loving it, the abrasion and nip of teeth.
"Get to it, man," Oz tells him and Larry kisses him once in pure joy, for this, his friend who plays with magic fingers and is so fucking brilliant in bed it should be outlawed in three states and probably is.
"Stop thinking, go," Oz-rumble of laughter and Larry feels it in his chest, waking warmth as he nuzzles neck and kisses the breastbone, lavishes attention on the nipples, slowly licking his way down, tasting salt and slight hints of sandalwood and the indefinable incense-y scent that is just Oz.
"Weirdo," he mumbles, muffled against the v of hair that leads down to his goal, curving nicely, just waiting to be taken care of. "Weird-ass. Oz."
Oz moves said ass slightly, suggestively lifting his hips. Clue enough even for Larry, who rests his head on Oz's belly and leans down to take the cock head between his lips and suck moistly, tongue coming out for a preliminary swipe.
"MMf..." which could have been a groan or a name, or just the sound of silence muffled against a pillow.
"Mom's in," he reminds Oz gleefully and decides that sucking is nice, but what he really should be doing is licking a nice trail up and around the shaft, tasting every inch and letting his mouth cover as much as he can.
"Mmm..." and they settle into a rhythm, Larry sucking slowly, alternating deep with light licks, blowing on areas that seem specially sensitive, while Oz contents himself grunting and pulling gently on Larry's hair, stroking the curls behind his ears and pressing thumb-kisses to the shell.
It's nice, just to be like this, comfortable, with nowhere to go, warmth and slightly oily taste in his mouth. Oz-warmth above and around him the earthy smell of rain beginning to seep in through the windows. For a moment, Larry has a fantasy of them doing this, almost exactly this on the rooftop, Oz's pants open and wet cock in Larry's mouth, the guitarist's soaked shirt plastered to his chest defining his nipples and the thought is so damn hot he forgets finesse and goes for broke.
Relax muscles and dee-eep throat and for a second he wants to throw up, so he holds and breathes till the gagging is less. Considerate Oz, holding off, not pushing, not fucking Larry's mouth though it was offered, definitely offered, and one day soon that would be cool and so hot, but for now, for now, this is good, this is great, this is abso-fucking marvellous, yea the taste is fucking marvellous . He's never understood the word before, but now he can use it in ordinary conversation. Oz tastes marvellous. Oz has a marvellous dick. Sucking Oz's cock is brain-numbingly marvellous.
Experimentally he moves down and lets Oz slide a little. The man gets the hint and moves gently, Larry keeping himself absolutely still while Oz moves slowly, hypnotically, in out, in out and did he mention this is absolutely unbelievable...Oh fuck, yea!
Can't keep it up for too long though, and regretfully he grunts, letting Oz know. Oz is out almost immediately, so nice and so restrained that Larry overflows with warmth and hurt for him, apologetically kissing and running his tongue over the wet glistening skin. Larry's in awe of Oz, the man with iron control, bowled over by the heroic restraint that can content itself with conveying the fuck-drive through gently painful twists to Larry's curls and frustrated grunts that hurt to hear, let alone say. The man deserves a fucking medal - yea that's right, he deserves a medal for fucking, let's hear it for Oz, Oz the marvellous, who's now rubbing his cock around Larry's lips - Oz-taste, let's hear it for Oz taste and Oz-scent, soft and warm - warning beads of wet gummy stuff that is Oz-taste and therefore marvellous, so whoo, let it happen, yea that's it buddy, that's right, just go on, YEA, that's it, that's it - and Larry applauds wholeheartedly, kissing and taking the spurting cock head into his mouth as Oz comes, silently but with urgent intensity. Larry holds him and comforts him, blessed to watch the expression on Oz's face, expressions that seem ugly on himself but so fucking beautiful when Oz lets go.
Speaking of which...
Whoa.
Larry lifts his head and chuckles, because somewhere around the time he was supposed to blow Oz's brains out...
He glances up for Oz's smile and settles down to the task of cleaning his partner up with kisses and a handful of moist wipes he keeps at the side of the bed for emergencies.
Clean-Oz is nice-Oz, with a comfortable purring rumble and a post-coital glow that warms and cheers. Larry nestles his head and snuffles Oz's cock, now lying more or less sated, but still looking absolutely delicious.
Larry smiles into Oz's groin and decides he could just fall asleep here.
Above him Oz hums, and his fingers tighten in Larry's hair, drumming softly and picking strands gently and tenderly, all in time to 'Dewdrop 7.'
---
Outside it's raining and the moon is full. Oz turns his head to watch, in thrall to the hum of moonlight, mind already strumming new chords and lyrics, fingers not yet itching for a pen, content to run the composition through Larry, feel the thrum of his pulse beneath the epidermis, touch lightly on his gentle life and draw strength and comfort from the feel of Larry nesting between his legs. It feels safe and strong, protector and protected, both and neither, lying like this entwined and comfortable with the ease of long lovers and friends. Oz smiles and runs his fingers through Larry's hair, wondering if he should wake Larry so maybe they can kiss.
Thought of the moment, gone and forgotten because it's nice this way too. Larry sleeping. Oz watching. While outside, the rain plays their song in E minor 6.
Smile on his face and moonlight in his veins, Oz lets the melody sweep him. Closes his eyes in silent gratitude, hands tightening once around the beloved head resting on him.
And heart beating in time to an as-yet-unnamed rhythm, Oz allows himself also to rest.
~ End 'Dewdrop 7.'
---
Next conjunction: Wild Hunt
---
---
3rd -plex: Wild Hunt
---
They release him on moonlit nights for sport. He runs, the lacerations on his back widening and bleeding where they've wedged in chips of communion wafers and sizzled drops of holy water so he won't heal, he can't heal, only let loose a trail that the blind could follow.
The blind do. Human boys hooting in the safety of blessed cars, confident with guns and crossbows, take aim and count coup on him, the only one - idiots, if they knew - who actually gives a damn what happenss to them four nights from now. And to save their miserable bastard lives he dives off the main roads and into the wooded areas, running and stumbling leading pursuers away from them and to him, cursing the soul that makes him care.
He runs for safety, wondering where would be safe.
Something whistles through the darkness. He ducks and rolls, counting on momentum to get him through, feeling the ridges of despair rise through his skin and over his face marking him.
His body refuses to die. His spirit needs to live.
Angel runs. They follow him, breathing heavily now, guttural sounds in the dark as they pick up his scent and growl in anticipation.
He stumbles and swears, moving forward at a crawl, refusing to fall, picking up momentum till he's on his feet again.
Angel runs, not looking behind.
Behind him, something watches.
---
Lucas is gaining on him. Angel grins horribly.
Good. First blood is always the best.
Suddenly, savagely turning, he gathers himself and leaps -
Hears a curse, maybe two, feels the body struggle below him as his hands close around the neck, punishing, twisting, cracking to kill...
SNAP!
Lucas' neck is now as disgustingly twisted as his sneer. Angel rears back in triumph, then remembers he is hungry.
Beggars can't be choosers. He lunges down and takes a thirsty gulp.
Then off and running again, seeking shadows and cover to keep them running.
There's one thing he knows that the minions don't. As long as he can satisfy the Master's desires, in some way alleviating the boredom of his prison, Angel will live. Painfully, perhaps, but he will live.
And he is not quite yet ready to die.
Why, he's not entirely sure, especially when on his knees swallowing acid and brimstone, the searing reek of the Master's warty flesh crinkling his nostrils and making him gag. But his spirit tells him live, his demon tells him fight and there is always the vain hope that one day he'll have the pleasure of ripping that bastard's penis from his body and stuffing it, bloody balls and all down the fucker's throat.
That day's not tonight, but the pleasure combined with vicarious blood gives Angel the strength to keep on running.
Behind him he hears something howl, and picks up the pace, not recovered sufficiently to take another down. He craves this, besides, this illusion of freedom. He lives for these nights, straining every hour for the scent of new moon rising that sweetens even the hours of torture that come before his release into the outer world.
And Angel knows the Master knows this, that he holds Angel by the promise of moments in the breeze against days in darkness and sour smelling rot. Which is why Angel kneels, if grudgingly, accepting hurt and taunt and the retching taste of demon seed.
The Master croons to him then, using his limited power to conjure pretty images of night sky and wind blown trees that float around them in glistening bubbles while Angel closes his eyes and tries not to shudder, not to come from the sheer pleasure-pain-disgust warring for supremacy.
One day, the Master promises him, stroking Angel's hair with un-groomed talons, one day you will lie beneath me and sing for me as I take you.
Angel bites down at that, sliding teeth easily into half-rotten flesh, waiting for curses and screams and only hearing laughter, the laughter that comes from the invulnerability of years when any sensation is worth feeling by the flesh. And Angel is left to spit out blood and disgust as eager minions bind him spread-eagled and pour alcohol and matches onto his unprotected skin.
I can heal you, the Master offers him. Holds out a wrist and promises eternal life. So much power, if you would only join with me Angelus.
There's that part of Angel that bucks and cries, remembering centuries when he did the same and more to his favourites. Recognising the binding of lust and hatred that makes all vampires kin.
But the spirit yells at him to live and the demon roars at him not to give in to this mother-fucker, so Angel only winks a bloody eye in a parody of admiration, shooting spit and blood out when the Master comes close enough to hear his answer.
The Master only laughs and bids him wait for his kiss. That when the harvest is done, there will be new additions to their game and the wild hunt will run for Angel's blood streaming from every orifice of his body and several new ones as well.
The Master promises Angel that he will enjoy this. And it is true that he has the power to make it so.
But for now night breezes wash away scent and fear and even the stings on his back are worth the price for freedom, to feel his legs stretching and muscles cramping with exhaustion and exhilaration as he runs -
And runs and runs holding himself upright by sheer will power, wondering if this is the night he will be able to keep running until it is dawn. If tonight he wouldn't mind dying if only he can hear their screams and the satisfying crackles as their skin blisters and pops open, withering to dust even as their eyeballs shatter.
No, tonight is not the night, so a tree-root trips him and this time he can't right himself, just falls and keeps rolling, rolling out of sheer desperation, in the hopes of a gully, a ravine, a valley, something, anything that can and will hide him - but sanctuary is not for the beasts and never was, so they're on him, teeth rending and tearing, reclaiming his borrowed blood, salivating over his wounds and howling in agony as the remnants of holy water and communion wafers char their skin.
He smiles in peaceful agony, passing out as they begin the long process of reworking him, breaking his bones in several different places and twisting them so they will not heal correctly. Again and again, twist, snap and crunch, shards of wrist and finger mingle, hold and freeze in terrors of rebirth before straightening out and reforming into flesh.
Angel screams. And screams and screams.
Three hours before dawn, they carry him back to the lair in triumph, flinging him at their Master's feet and standing back in worshipful obedience, waiting for the pronouncement of their revered leader.
Who leans down from his prison of fire and bone and runs a careful talon over the bloody lips of his grandson, smirking delightedly.
I gave you a century, at the most.
You owe me at least that much.
In his sleep, Angel stirs.
Go fuck yourself granddad.
And passes out as a booted foot descends sharply on his spine, leaving him hovering between life and dark to dream wistfully of the final hunt.
---
Epilogue
---
The library at Sunnydale High is quiet except for the sound of a fountain pen scratching. Rupert Giles is a traditionalist. He prefers the smooth glide of ink on paper to the irksome swathe of a biro.
Footsteps approach hesitantly, stopping just in front of the recording librarian. He looks up and into -
Hazel, no blue eyes and blond hair, uncertain features and a black book in his hand
Giles shakes his head slightly to dislodge the feeling of deja vu.
The boy smiles uncertainly and puts out a hand
"Mr. Giles?" and waits while Giles doesn't take it.
Smile a little steadier now, and hand still in position, the boy looks Giles straight in the eye, daring him to pay attention to the words his lips are shaping even now.
"My name is Riley Walsh and I'm looking for a Watcher."
Wondering whether to laugh or to cry and discarding all of those options in favour of the obvious, Giles reaches forward and takes the boy's hand.
"Why?" he asks, absently noting the grip and strength of the hand, surprisingly calloused for one so young. "Why are you looking for a Watcher."
Riley shrugs and smiles, still gripping his hand.
"I don't know. Maybe you can tell me. Doesn't every Slayer need one?"
~ End -plex.
---
I have either started a novel or throttled one at birth. Either way... *grin* This was fun.
If this were the Buffy verse, the timeline would be set at or before 'Welcome to the hell mouth'. But this isn't, so it isn't. So there.
Feedback would be neat: spyke_raven@gatefiction.com
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