EchoBelly - Great Things.
All is fair in love and war,
Or so they say and so the saying goes,
But I've seen more broken hearts,
Than you can count the bullets in a war.
Oh what do I know.
There's gotta be so much I don't know
The Worthy Judge - Chapter 2. I Want to do Great Things!
Two weeks go by like a chapter of Dante - full of Hell and not much Heaven. Night after night of going back to the scene of revelations, I play with my food, tossing it across the plate, spearing it with my fork/stake or whatever else I have.
None of them die an easy death but what do I care? Except I do which is one unexpected addition to, 'Faith Changes'. Like tonight, when the hunt was different. The Vamp was smaller. Like, younger smaller. Like, a kid, younger smaller. Like, no more than ten. And she looked like me when I was growing up. All long wavy hair and dirty clothes. One difference. She had a teddy bear covered in dirt, and after I snapped through her neck, covered in dust. The only thing that remained was the sound of her screaming in my head. A little ten year old crying for you to stop hurting her doesn't leave you, ever.
Now I'm leaning against a gravestone looking at that teddy bear, wondering how the Hell things got so screwed and who sold my soul to turn me into this person who gets the pleasure of protecting a world that doesn't give a shit about her? It certainly wasn't me.
I stand, full of a tough case of shocked empty and dust my pants off, deciding that maybe it's time I went to see what happened for myself. A serial killer always revisits the scene of the crime. A gem I bought away from prison with me.
Perhaps Sunnydale needs an unwelcome visitor of the highest order?
######
During the next three weeks I don't go anywhere. Well, nowhere important. I wander the streets sucking my teeth at the Christmas lights showing… does anyone really know what they're celebrating anymore? How can half the world commemorate a religious occasion based on a book they've never read?
The world is a crazy place.
19th December. I patrol the graveyards.
20th December. I patrol the graveyards.
21st December. I patrol the graveyards.
I protect the innocents who pass me in the streets as I'm drowning in a sadness I can't put my finger on. A suffocating, deep, dark, big bad that no amount of stakes can turn to dust.
22nd. Three days from Christmas. I sit in the diner across from the bus station, the one I spend a lot of my time in. It's clean, cheap but more importantly I'm left alone.
I start on my third cup of black coffee, pushing my fingertip onto grains of spilt sugar then dropping them into the clean ashtray. My little habit. Everyone has to have one. It makes us all human.
"Refill?"
I shake my head without looking up, speaking the first words I've said to a live person in weeks.
"No. Thanks."
A plate with a slice of cherrypie and blob of cream slides in front of my eyes.
"On the house. Happy Christmas."
I glance up and see the back of the server walking away, not waiting for or expecting a thank you. Then I look down at my plate, at my first and probably last Christmas present this year.
I eat my pie and cream in silence.
It's the small things that mean the most. I scribble on a paper napkin as I leave, "Thank you. Happy Christmas."
######
Darkness comes and covers the streets outside in a film of sadness and sorrow. It occurs to me that I don't even know the name of the town I'm in. Not that I need to. It doesn't really matter but it's always nice to know where you've ended up.
I walk for what seems like hours, paying no attention to anything or anyone. My Slayer sense has perked up since I got out and will keep me out of major trouble.
When I finally stop I look up, outside that same diner and opposite that same bus station. A flickering sign on the front of a bus gets my attention: Sunnydale.
Who am I to argue with Fate?
