Dark Are the Shadows 09/11/2020

Dark are the Shadows
BTVS/Dark Shadows crossover
Ms Hunter Ash

ripperbard7@yahoo.com
frost29@post.com

Rating: PG13
Pairings: Buffy/Quentin, Xander, Anya, Giles/Angelique, Willow/Tara, Barnabas/Roxanne, Julia/Thomas

# # # 

# # # #

Barnabas took the keys a clerk handed him and folded the papers and slipped them into his cloak. He picked up his carry-on case and smiled at Roxanne who was waiting near the door. “Let's see if we can find anyone. If they aren't at the mansion we'll call.”

“All right,” Roxanne said. “At least Nicholas isn't hovering somewhere in the darkness.”

“Amen,” Barnabas agreed.

# # #

“It's always open!” a voice yelled as Spike knocked on a door at the top of a set of outside stairs.

Spike opened the door and walked in, followed by Xander. There was a fire burning in a fireplace and this was complimented by a desk covered with books, papers and a manual typewriter.

“What can I do for you boys?” a small, thin man asked. “Want some cocoa?”

“No, we need information,” Spike said.

“We need to find Glory,” Xander blurted out. “Ben is Glory.”

“Who's that?” Doc asked as he looked up.

“Terrific, now he remembers,” Spike muttered. “Hellgod type, name of Glory, has gone missing. She's brewing up some major-league bad and she's nicked the Slayer's kid in the bargain.”

“You care for the girl?” Doc asked.

“Yeah, any idea where Glory would take her?” Spike asked.

“You don't mean Glorificus,” Doc asked as he got up from his chair. “Gosh. What do you wanna get mixed up with her for? That's a sure way to get yourselves killed. I hear she's awfully unpleasant. When it comes to hellgods, my best advice ... is get out of the way ... and stay there.”

“Would love to,” Spike said. “Can't.”

“Well, uh, other than that...” Doc hesitated and closed a drawer on a chest. “I'd like to help ... but I-I'm a small-town guy. This Glorificus is big city.”

“She has my friend,” Spike said firmly.

“Right,” Doc pondered and looked at his two visitors. “Well, there's this guy in China, he might...”

“And how do we get to China, teleport?” Spike demanded.

“I guess,” Doc said. “You know, if you're in that much of a hurry...”

Spike's eyes narrowed as he took in a box behind the shop-keep. “You're lying.”

Doc removed his glasses and stared at the vampire.

“And what's more ... I believe you're standing right in front of the very thing we need,” Spike suggested.

Doc merely smiled and leaped to his left and was next behind Spike. As the vampire turned with a surprised express Doc grabbed a sword leaning against a wall and held the tip to Spike's throat. “Idiot.”

Doc lunged towards the vampire to stab him but Spike knocked the sword blade aside and fell backwards, knocking a stack of books down on him.

Doc opened his mouth and a super-long tongue snaked out to smack Xander in the chest and slammed him against a wall. The tongue receded back into Doc's mouth.

“You think only underworld bottom-feeders worship the beast?” Doc demanded. He kicked Spike in the face and took the box and threw it into the fireplace. “Her day is coming, boys! And when she returns, then you're gonna see something!”

Xander grabbed Doc and bent the creature over and kneed Doc in the chest. The two began to grapple while Spike rushed to the fireplace and pulled the box out. Xander managed to grab the sword and get to his knees. With a yell he thrust the blade down through Doc's chest and flinched as blue blood sprayed up from the wound.

Xander got to his feet and wiped at his face. Looking over at Spike he saw the vampire with the box. “What have we got?”

“Something worth dying for,” Spike said as he looked down at Doc. “Come on.”

Unknown to both of them, Doc's eyes opened when the door shut behind them.

# # # #

Willow opened the door to the mansion and sighed with relief and hugged Barnabas tightly. Barnabas, Roxanne and Willow walked into the mansion.

“We got here as soon as we could,” Barnabas said. “What's happened since we last talked to anyone?”

Before Willow responded everyone's attention was drawn to Buffy and Quentin as they walked in. Her eyes were red from crying but she held the gaze of everyone.

“Anyone hear from Spike and Xander?” she asked.

“Not yet,” Angel answered.

“Anya went to stay with your mother, Giles hasn't gotten back yet,” Tara added.

Barnabas and Roxanne turned and looked at the door just before it opened and Giles and Angelique walked in.

“Giles, are you all right? Should you be out of the hospital?” Willow asked anxiously.

“He insisted,” Angelique answered.

“Of course he did,” Buffy said. “Mom knows?”

“She knows that we're going to get Dawn back,” Giles said firmly.

# # # ##

Dawn cowered on the metal steps outside a warehouse. She had witnessed a chaotic scene of Glory and Ben morphing back n forth while arguing and bargaining with each other. Threats, promises, ultimatums and terror had danced back and forth between the two entities sharing one form.

She looked up at Ben with a slight hope. Could he hold his form long enough to rescue her?

The young man walked over and held out his hand. “I'm sorry.”

Dawn stood up with a smile and then yelled when Ben grabbed her by her wrist tightly.

“Don't make this any harder than it already is,” Ben said. “It's you or me. When she wins she'll see that I continue to exist.”

# # # #

Buffy glanced over at Giles as he poured over the papers they had found in the box that Spike and Xander had returned to the mansion with. She knew her Watcher and step-father, he was engrossed in the words on the pages and frantic.

“Are you all right?” Angel asked as he sat down next to Buffy. “We.... I couldn't reach you.”

“Yeah, I will be,” Buffy said as she looked at him. “I could hear you, I could hear everyone but... it was like it was far away. Everyone wanted me to run and catch up with them and I was tired. Metaphorically or something.”

“How did...?” Angel began to ask and hesitated.

“Quentin didn't want me to catch up,” Buffy said softly. “He caught me as I fell. I didn't have to be strong.”

Angel nodded after a moment. “I'm sorry. I didn't know how to reach you, maybe I never did.”

“Angel, I'm not going to spend the next twenty minutes helping you beat yourself up and I won't protest and try to convince you that....we still have that connection,” Buffy said. “What we had was magical but fleeting. You remain the same, I didn't.”

Angel frowned.

“I love you, Angel,” Buffy whispered. “I always will but I'm not in love with you and I am your equal, you know, and there's some places that you can't go that only I can and this is one of them. I need you, I need all of you to help get Dawn back but it's ultimately my responsibility to stop Glory somehow. No matter what it takes.”

“We'll be there,” Angel said after several moments. “I hope he's good to you, Buff.”

“Thanks, for everything,” Buffy said and kissed his cheek and got up and approached Giles. “Is there anything we can use in there?”

“Well, according to these scrolls... well, it's possible for Glory to be stopped,” Giles stammered.

“Go on,” Buffy urged.

“I-I'm afraid it's, um ... well, Buffy, I've read these things very carefully and there's not much ... margin for error. You understand what I'm saying?” he asked.

“It would help if you actually said something,” Buffy complained.

Giles pulled his glasses off and rubbed his eyes. “Um ... Glory ... plans to open a ... dimensional portal ... by way of a ritual bloodletting. Dawn's blood. Once the blood is shed at a certain time and place ... the fabric which separates all realities will ... be ripped apart.”

Buffy sensed most of the crowd move closer to the table as Giles explained.

“That doesn't sound fun,” Xander muttered.

“Dimensions will ... pour into one another, uh, with no barriers to stop them,” Giles continued. “Reality as we know it will be destroyed, and ... chaos will reign on earth.”

Silence filled the room for several moments.

“So how do we stop it?” Buffy asked. She knew Giles, she knew she wasn't going to like what he was going to say.

“The portal will only close once the blood is stopped ... and the only way for that to happen is...” Giles hesitated and then looked at his Slayer, his step-daughter. “Buffy, the only way is to kill Dawn.”

# # # #

Quentin frowned as he watched Giles and Willow pouring over the scrolls from the box. It had been an hour since Giles had told everyone the ultimate price of the ritual if it was allowed to start, Dawn's death.

Buffy was pacing and everyone else were quiet, as if afraid to add to the tension.

Buffy stopped pacing and looked at Giles. “Anything?”

“Nothing you want to hear,” Giles said wearily. “The ritual is... it...”

“Explain it again,” Buffy said.

“There's nothing new,” Giles protested.

“Go through it again,” Buffy insisted.

Giles sighed and nodded. “The key was living energy. It needed to be channeled, poured into a specific place at a specific time. The energy... would flow into that spot, the walls between the dimensions break down. It stops, the energy's used up, the walls come back up. Glory uses that time to get back into her own dimension, not caring that all manner of hell will be unleashed on earth in the meantime.

“But only for a little while, right?” Xander asked. “The walls come back up, uh, no more hell?”

“That's only if the energy is stopped,” Willow said. “And now the key is human, the key is Dawn.”

Giles picked up a scroll. “The blood flows, the gates will open. The gates will close when it flows no more” he quoted. “When Dawn is dead.

“Why blood? Why Dawn's blood?” Xander asked.

“'Cause it's always got to be blood,” Spike said.

“We're not actually discussing dinner right now,” Xander snapped.

“Blood is life, lack-brain,” Spike countered. “Why do you think we feed on it? It's what keeps you going, makes you warm, makes you hard. It makes you other than dead. Of course it's blood.”

“Pretty simple math here,” Buffy said. “We stop Glory before she can start the ritual. We still have at least a couple of hours, right?”

“If my calculations are right,” Giles said. “But, Buffy....”

“I don't wanna hear it,” she snapped and turned away from Giles.

“I understand that...”

“No!” Buffy snapped as she turned to look at Giles. “No, you don't understand. We are not talking about this.”

Giles jumped to his feet. “Yes, we bloody well are!” he yelled. He sighed after a moment. “If Glory begins the ritual... if we can't stop her...”

“Come on,” Buffy said, nearly yelling. “Say it! We're bloody well talking about this. Tell me to kill my sister.”

“She's....”

“No, she's not my sister,” Buffy interrupted. “She's more than that. She's me. The monks made her out of me. I feel closer to her than...”

The Slayer sighed and looked down. “It's not just the memories they built, its physical. Dawn is part of me. The only part that I...”

“We'll solve this,” Willow said firmly. “We will. Just... don't retreat mentally again.”

“If the ritual starts,” Giles said quietly. “Then every living creature in this and every other dimension imaginable will suffer unbearable torment and death including Dawn.”

“The last thing she'll see is me protecting her,” Buffy declared.

“You'll fail, you'll die,” Giles said. “We all will.”

The Watcher and step-father turned and walked towards the patio.

“I'm sorry,” Buffy called. “I love you all but... I'm sorry.”

Giles turned to look at her as she turned away.

“Okay,” Xander said and raised his hand. All in favor of stopping Glory BEFORE the ritual? Suggestions, ideas? Time is a'wasting.”

“When you say you love us all....”

“Shut up, Spike,” Xander and Giles yelled in unison.

“Will, Tara, I bet you've got some dark spell brewing,” Cordelia commented. “Like... making her into a toad?”

“What about Ben?” Quentin asked. “He can be killed, right? I realize he's somewhat innocent but so is Dawn. Can any of you kill someone innocent?”

Silence greeted his question for a moment.

“God,” Xander whispered.

“Then it will fall to some of us outsiders,” Barnabas said calmly.

“It's doubtful he'll surface again this close to the ritual,” Giles commented. “We can expect to be dealing with Glory.”

“Got room for us?”

Everyone turned to see Joyce and Anya at the door.

“Mom! You shouldn't be out of the hospital,” Buffy protested.

“I insisted,” Joyce said firmly. “I'm here for my daughters and our family.”

“How much did you hear?” Buffy asked.

“Questions about killing Ben,” Joyce said. “Something I will do willingly to protect everyone but especially you and Dawn.”

“Well... we don't have to kill her,” Willow said. “Uh, we just have to stop her from doing the ritual. I mean, there's only the one time that she can do it, right?”

“Yeah,” Spike said. “We get her on the ropes, we just gotta keep her occupied till it's too late.”

“Okay, but we're not coming up with ideas,” Cordelia complained. “She's a god, let's think outside the box.”

“Why don't YOU go think outside the bleeding box,” Spike said with a growl.

“Does anyone have something to contribute?” Giles asked wearily as Angelique urged him to sit back down.

“The Dagon sphere!” Anya exclaimed.

“What?” Giles asked.

“I found one and thought it might come in useful,” Anya said. “It arrived yesterday, it's still in the box and... and... we have a troll hammer, it's enchanted. You want to fight a god, use the weapon enchanted by a god.”

“Come on, Quentin,” Buffy said firmly. “Let's go get those things.”

“It's too heavy,” Spike protested and Buffy picked up a heavy chair. “Uh, right, good.”

“Thanks, Anya,” Buffy said. “Everyone keep thinking.”

“Here to help,” Anya said. “I wanna live.”

“Smart chicks are so hot,” Xander declared.

“We still don't know how to find her,” Giles pointed out.

“What about that nutjob in the hospital?” Spike asked. “The only one left, she kept trying to get out of her straps to get on the job, as she put it.”

“Quentin and I will swing by the hospital,” Buffy said.

“No, let Roxanne and me go,” Barnabas said. “We can bypass locked doors easier than you.”

“That will extend a lot of energy, it might weaken you before the battle but it might be the only way to find her,” Giles said thoughtfully. “All those patients escaped for a reason.”

“Let's go,” Buffy urged her boyfriend.

# ## ##

Ben approached Dawn as she sat in a room of the warehouse, her legs pulled up to her chest. “They said you have to put this on for the ceremony,” he said as he held out a pile of clothing.

“What if I don't?” Dawn demanded.

“Come on, just...”

“What if I don't like the color?”

“Look, I wish there was another way,” Ben said.

“And I wish you'd fall on your head,” Dawn snapped. “And... drown in your own barf. I guess we're both disappointed.”

“I think it'll be quick,” Ben said.

“Actually, sir, the bleeding is quite a slow process so as to give the portal time to...” a minion began.

“Thank you!” Ben said with irritation. “For the information. I'll do what I can to...”

“Change,” Dawn said.

“What?” Ben asked.

“Change,” Dawn insisted. “Be her. I don't want to look at you.”

Ben shook his head. “Dawn, I don't think you want...”

“Be Glory!” she yelled. “Be Glory! At least she has an excuse for all of this! Glory! Glory! Glory!”

“Will you just stop....”

“Shouting already?” Glory demanded. She shook out the garment she found herself holding to discover a medieval style dress. “So what's the hubbub, bub? What do you got against Benjy?”

“He's a monster,” Dawn said softly. “At least you're up front about it.”

Glory shrugged as she sat down. “Don't be hard on the boy. He just wants to live, most guys would do the same. Besides, he's probably the reason your sis and her little cartoon pals are still alive. That little nagging pinch of humanity that makes me go for the hurt instead of the kill. Lowering myself to trade blows with the Slayer when I should have just put my fist through her heart.”

Glory stood up and looked at the dress.

“That's gotta be Ben,” she commented.

“Or maybe you just can't take her,” Dawn countered.

Glory tossed the dress to Dawn while hanging on to one end. When Dawn grabbed the other end, Glory yanked and pulled Dawn to her feet.

Dawn didn't back down.

“Funny thing, you've been here for a few hours now, and I haven't seen big sis galloping in to save you,” Glory commented. “She probably knows what a terrible mistake that'd be.”

“She's not afraid of you,” Dawn insisted.

“Oh no, sweetie baby,” Glory said with a smile. “I'm talking about the ritual. 'Cause you know I bleed you, the portals open, but once you die they close. The faster you die, the better for your sorry species.”

Dawn pulled back slightly.

“I'm betting Buffy knows that,” Glory continued. “Since she's not really your sister, I'm guessing she isn't gonna show. And if she does.... It might not be to save you.”

The hellgod pushed Dawn to the floor and smirked. “Get dressed.”