disclaimer in part 1

Swan Song
By Diane
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THE SANCTUARY

His hands trembled as he struggled to light the match and
throw it into the basin. He couldn't quite get the damn
thing to strike right. The head scratched the grated
surface, hissing as it slipped along the length of it. Heat
of friction, but no fire. He growled. The match book fell
from his suddenly failing grip, and he pounced after it like
a big cat, bringing it back up to the altar. Just couldn't
quite get...

< No! Oh, God. It's not enough time... >

He let out a sob as the match finally flared, almost,
_almost_ able to feel Buffy's burning tears damp and
trickling on his chest. The halo of light flickering up
from the match head glowed softly in the darkness, and he
could smell the sweet scent of burning wood.

Warmth.

He held the flame a bare centimeter from his pale skin,
giving him the true countenance of an angel, but he couldn't
see himself reflected in anything, even in the glowing ring
on his finger. Not a creature of God...

Pupils contracting under the glare of the dancing flame, he
blinked.

< When I kiss you, I wanna die... >

As the flame crept down the match stick like a twisting,
fiery snake, he let it fall from his shaking fingers. A
rip-roar explosion mushroomed upwards and flames licked
towards his face. He backed away just in time.

"I beseech access to the knowing ones," he said, thoughts of
Buffy never leaving him. Get her back, get her back,
getherback...

Damp tears, on his chest. They were getting more and more
real as each second flashed by. Wet. Salty.

Ache, in his chest. Familiar ache. A vice clamping up
around his still heart.

He would bring her back.

But now, was time for answers.

The stones that covered the doorway melted into a harsh,
flaring vortex. Screaming, gaping light. His sensitive
eyes took a long moment to adjust, but he stepped forward,
into the doorway.

The brightness flashed before him, and then he was there,
standing in the marbled temple, a hallway leading off into
the light. "I want to talk to you!" he belted out, ignoring
the pain that it brought him.

His voice echoed off the walls and rumbled back through him,
deep, and clear. Menacing.

The torches beside the entrance flickered softly, and the
room glowed, but all that was there were two crumpled
skeletons, left on the floor since their deaths, a year ago.
Bleached, and alone. As though they had been left out for
the vultures.

A gust of cool, haunted air blew over his skin, and he
shivered, truly feeling the cold. It swept up around him in
the silence, ruffling the sinew cob-webs, which were hanging
from the walls and corners like flags heralding a
celebration. They swayed in the breeze.

Silence.

He felt strange, like he was disturbing a graveyard. He
didn't let that stop him.

"HEY! ONE OF YOUR WARRIORS HAS AN ISSUE! WHERE THE HELL IS
CUSTOMER SERVICE?!" he shouted, cupping his hands around his
mouth to give himself more projection. His diaphragm was
starting to refuse him its use, and he felt it painfully
begging for relief. He hunched over as a stir of echoes
rumbled up around him. SERVICE... Service... service...

Another cool breeze ruffled against his skin. Cool touch,
so opposite the burning wetness on his chest. He looked
down and was surprised that his black shirt actually had a
dark, wet spot over his chest.

"Damn you, come out and talk!" he screamed, committing his
fist to the air in an angry gesture, but his voice cracked
and failed. Only a whisper was granted to him, and he
almost fell over as his abdomen swept him into a sea of
agony.

He glanced around through the darkness, his eyes pausing on
the bright light at the end of the hallway. No guards there
this time...

Creeping forward with stumbling steps, he made his way down
the hallway and into the light. It blinded him, and he
tried to blink it away, but he couldn't see, no matter how
hard his pupils tried to compensate. Searing pain lanced
through his head whenever he tried to open his eyes.

His legs buckled and he fell to the ground -- cold and
smooth. More marble. He felt forward with his hands, and
kept crawling, even as he felt his cold blood spilling out
onto the floor.

"Hey!" he whispered hoarsely, although it was an attempted
shout. "I'm talking to you, whoever you are! Come out and
face me, you bastards!"

Muscles collapsing all at once, he went from a crawl to a
crashing halt. His jaw nicked the hard floor and sent
itself ramming back into his head, the jolt flowing back
through his skull like a shockwave. With a racking groan,
he rolled over onto his back.

So. This was how they were finally going to get rid of him.
He was important for the End of Days, only in the capacity
that he was fighting for him. But now he was fucking with
them and they were going to kill him off. His teeth grit
together in anger.

"Go ahead and kill me. I won't fight for you anymore,
anyway," he growled, but his voice came out in more of a
whistling sigh rather than speech.

He heaved himself back onto his stomach and continued
forward. "I demand to speak with whoever is in charge,
here!" he called blindly. He couldn't even tell if he was
moving forward because his sense of direction was completely
flummoxed.

"You screwed up one of your prophecies. I'd like to return
it," he cried, the sarcasm dripping from his voice in oozing
buckets.

He clawed out with a hand, intending to move forward again,
intent on letting his innards spill out into Their
sanctuary. But his fingers met a bump, a raised surface on
what had been for miles, it seemed, flat. A foot. Toes.
Five of them.

"Why do you disrupt this temple?" a soft, bell of a voice
swept against his ears. The feeling of her presence was
like morphine. Drunkenly, he rolled onto his back as the
pain left him, his eyelids fell open. Nothing but endless
white, like blindness in reverse. He still couldn't see,
but it didn't hurt to stare into the white void anymore.

He heard some shuffling, and could sense that someone was
crouching over him. His shirt was lifted up, but he was too
dazed to protect himself. Gasping, he felt five small
fingertips as they brushed against his broken skin. The
touch of a feather. Smooth and soothing against his pain.

"Warrior, you are injured..." she sighed.

The fingertips spread apart and collapsed into a soft,
fleshy palm. Warm. Tingling. He felt it spreading from
his center out into the tips of his fingers, and when he
mustered the coordination to reach down, he felt the wound
closing under his touch.

A flash flood of relief swept through his veins, and he
almost let out an anguished sob. Thank you. He finally had
audience with Them. He hoped.

The hand moved across his skin, upwards, caressing his chest
just over his heart. "I am sorry I cannot fix this," she
whispered.

Something wet dropped onto his face. Tears. He blinked,
wishing he could see her.

"Please, bring the Slayer back, I beg you. Take me for her,
anything, I'll do it. I swear," he whispered, feeling the
tears form in his eyes.

Her hands were on his face now, caressing his skin like a
lover, like she was fascinated with him. "The Slayer cannot
be brought back. It is not within Our power to reverse the
forces already at work."

"No. No. I can't accept that..." he said, shaking his
head, but the world was spinning. This couldn't be it. He
had come all this way for it... This couldn't be it. It
couldn't. It couldn't...

Tears spiraled out of his eyes.

He felt warmth on his face, and knew innately that it was
because she was smiling. "Yes, you can. Be calmed. In
time, you will understand."

The glowing, tingling, warmth spread through him again, and
he relaxed onto the floor in a drugged stupor. Bliss that
wasn't his melted into his skin, and he shuddered under its
burning, comforting touch. "You promised me she would be
safe if I turned back..." he struggled with denial.

"We never promised you anything. You came to your own
conclusions." She was cupping his chin now, running her
fingers through his hair, fleeting across his skin. "I have
not seen a Warrior come this far in so very long. I am
lonely..."

"Who are you?" he murmurred, unable to bring himself to
struggle out of her grasp and go back the way he had come,
not that he knew which direction that was, anyway.

He gasped as he was pulled into a sitting position and
hugged against her small frame. Silk robes fell against his
skin and caressed his cheek with empty softness. "It
doesn't matter."

He blinked, the murky whiteness before his eyes becoming
even thicker, if it were possible. "Are you one of Them?"

The warmth of her smile spread across him again. Warmth.
He almost felt himself give into her embrace even further,
just trying to get more of the heat that radiated from her
very presence. "The Slayer is safe." The whisper slid over
the nape of his neck, crawled into his pores, and he felt
himself relaxing further.

"You must fight."

Clarity snapped back into him. They were bribing him back
to Them. And damn it, he couldn't muster the strength to
care. He just wanted her back. More hot tears wet his
face, but this time, they were his own.

"I can't. I can't," he chanted. A mantra. Running from
his lips--a babbling brook of agony. "Bring her back..."

"She is not gone. She is here." He felt the palm, back
on his chest. "You must fight."

"Bring her back, bring her back," he sobbed, losing all
grips on himself as he blindly reached for whatever Power
was holding him.

"Her gift was death. Her gift to you. It takes time."

Another smile. Her arms clasped around him and the warmth
bled into him. He could feel it seeping through him,
caressing his newly healed flesh. And then he felt himself
being swept up in a jarring hiss of energy that spat him out
back in the office, healed, and trembling at the feet of his
friends.

The warmth was gone.

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