Sic Transit Gloria Mundi
by Kirayoshi
A Man of Wealth and Taste
[reviews]
Chapter four;
A Man Of Wealth And Taste
"Please allow me to introduce myself,
I'm a man of wealth and taste.
I've been around for many long years,
Stolen many a man's soul and faith.
I've been around since Jesus Christ
Had His moment of doubt and hate.
Made damn sure that Pilate
Washed his hands and sealed His fate.
Pleased to meet you,
Hope you guessed my name.
But what's puzzling you,
That's the nature of my game."
--The Rolling Stones
"Sympathy For the Devil"
Giles picked up a shard of glass from a long-ago broken window, and used the sharp edge to slice away at the ropes that held Dawn to the altar stone. "Where's Buffy?" Dawn cried as she was freed. Giles hesitated to speak, but Dawn insisted; "Where is she, Giles?"
Giles gulped and craned his head toward the site where Buffy had fallen during her final battle with Glory. Willow and Xander were desperately trying to save her life; Xander breathing into her lungs while Willow pressed down on her chest to start her heart.
"C'mon, Buff," Xander whispered between breaths. "You're starting to scare me." He counted the compressions Willow was giving Buffy; what was it, five compressions, one breath? He breathed again, thinking of nothing but saving his friend, his hero.
"Don't do this to me, Buffy," Willow moaned as she continued her compressions. "I forbid you to die on me now, you hear me? You die on me now, I'll never forgive you." She continued to compress Buffy's chest, while the others looked on silently. The seconds ticked by with an agonizing slowness. Willow's red hair was matted with sweat and plastered to her face, and the strain was threatening to cause her shoulders to buckle.
Tara touched Willow's shoulder and sadly said, "I'm sorry, Willow, but I'm afraid it's too late. She's gone."
"I didn't hear that," Willow barked at Tara, not missing a beat with her compressions.
"I fear Tara's right, Willow," Giles said, his voice threatening to catch. "There's nothing more we can do for her."
"I SAID I DIDN'T HEAR THAT!" Willow shouted. "And if you ever want me to forgive you, I won't hear it again!" The others fell silent as Willow redoubled her efforts to save Buffy's life.
And the seconds dragged on...
========
All she could do was scream.
For what seemed like an eternity, she was subjected to excruciating pain. Pain like a thousand lashes on every square centimeter of her flesh. Pain like a thousand fires searing her skin. Pain like a hundred tons crushing her bones.
And her tormentor sat back and laughed.
"Saw the coolest t-shirt at the Hot Topic just a couple of days before you finally staked me, Buffy," Spike chortled as his minions tormented his victim. "Seems appropriate, don't it?" He showed her the shirt he wore under his duster jacket; basic black with white text, reading "Heaven doesn't want me and Hell's afraid I'll take over." He got up from his throne, walked casually toward Buffy as she was strapped to her slab of rock, and shooed off the demons who tortured her. "Please, let's give her the chance to recover. We wouldn't want her to become accustomed to this level of pain. Not yet." He leaned in closer to the Slayer, licking his lips salaciously. "After all, we have all of eternity to get acquainted."
Buffy said nothing to her tormentor. She just gazed balefully at him.
"Hoohoohoo! I know what's going through your pretty blonde head, Slayer." Spike gestured as he walked away from her, and the bonds that held Buffy's wrists slackened enough for Buffy to remove her hands. "You're not going to let me see any emotion on those lovely features. You'll be damned before you let me see you break." He turned sharply and pointed at Buffy, glaring hard. "News flash, Slayer; you're already damned!" Another gesture and the scene changed. Buffy found herself standing next to an enormous glass wall. Looking toward the wall, she gaped as she saw a heavyset man being chased by a hellish looking sea creature. She squinted as she looked at the doomed man, and gasped hard; Coach Marin.
"You remember him, don't you, Buffy?" Spike laughed as he displayed his bizarre aquarium. "Didn't he force his swim team to take some super steroid that turned them into fish-men? Ah he was a bad 'un." He gestured toward a table where he kept a rat maze. "C'mon, you'll love this," he beckoned with cyanide sweetness. Buffy hesitantly edged toward the rat maze. Peering in, she was shocked to see the diminutive figure of her former high school principal, Mr. Snyder, running frantically from a large rat. "A rat hunting his own," Spike smiled. "His sole purpose in living was to make others miserable. To make them run futilely from one class to another, all the while secretly planning with Mr. Wilkins to snuff their future." He grinned as the rat grabbed the damned soul in his jaws, causing Buffy to shudder. "Oh don't worry, he does that every night."
Spike drew a cloth over the cage, and turned his full attention to Buffy. "You can't help them, Slayer. Just like you couldn't help anyone else. Just another bloody useless Slayer."
He showed Buffy a few more of his bizarre trophies. One Buffy recognized instantly; the cheerleader's trophy that housed the tortured soul of the evil witch Catherine Madison. Spike then pulled out a plastic box and displayed it proudly to Buffy. Buffy looked at the box and stared hard; it looked for all the world like an old Operation game, but the face of the cartoony patient was that of former Initiative leader Maggie Walsh. Spike produced a pair of tweezers, and announced, "Watch me remove her funny bone." He tried to manipulate the tweezers to remove the plastic piece from the board, but kept slipping. With each mistake, and he made many, the face lit up like a neon sign, and an inhuman shriek echoed loudly in Buffy's ears. "Oops," Spike giggled manically. "Touched the sides." He tossed the game away, and whirled dirvishley around the room.
Buffy glared at Spike, this self-styled devil, as he capered with glee through his realm. Staring at him through hooded eyes, she spoke her first words since her last moments on Earth; "Go to Hell, Spike."
Spike started to chuckle, as the image of the aquarium and the rat cage drifted away. His low chuckle slowly gathered strength, and as he laughed, he began to tower over the fallen Slayer. Ten feet, fifteen feet, twenty-five feet, fifty, a hundred. Buffy found herself standing at the edge of a narrow precipice, scalding flames below her, her own personal devil above her. His unholy laughter rolled across the canyons of the Pit, gathering like a terrible storm. "You don't get it, do you Slayer girl? THIS IS HELL!"
He slapped his knees, trembling with hateful mirth. "This is your hell, Slayer, and I'm in charge here! And I'm going to introduce you to torments that you could never imagine. I will break you, then watch you rebuild yourself, then break you again, a million times over. And with every scream, with every moan, I'll drink me a swig of Guinness and piss myself laughing!" He suddenly stood behind Buffy, who had already begun to succumb to the inevitability of her damnation. "I told you before, your death wish would kick in, and I'd come in and have me," he pushed her over the edge, "a real good time." He laughed as he watched Buffy fall, and fall forever, into the abyss. Buffy didn't even fight him. She knew in the depths of her soul that she deserved this Hell, for all of her failures.
"Heads up, Spikester!" A loud and brash voice rang out, shattering Spike's concentration. He spun 'round, and saw a dark rider, astride a gray steed that literally ran across the air. The rider steered her horse down into the pit, catching up with the falling Slayer. She grabbed Buffy by the wrist, and threw her across the saddle. She then nickered to the horse and tugged the reins, and her horse lifted itself up and flew out of the chasm.
"Some ride, huh, B?" the rider announced, a strange joy lighting her voice. "And me playing cavalry like that! Is this wicked cool or what?" Buffy somehow managed to sit herself up behind the rider and grabbed her by the waist. She then took a close look at her savior and startled.
"Faith?"
"The one and only, sista Slaya," Faith shouted happily. "What say we make like a shepherd and get the flock out of here?" She drove her steed faster, as they quickly made their way out of Spike's reach.
"No!" the enraged demon shouted. "My only release from Hell was knowing that Buffy would be mine to torture! NOOOOOOO!" He grew taller with each screamed word, flailing about to catch Buffy and her rescuer. Faith however was too swift for the monster to catch. Within a twinkling, she and Buffy were gone.
"So, B, what's a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?" Faith asked, then laughed. "I always wanted to say that."
"Well," Buffy said tiredly, unsure of what was awaiting her, "I died. I guess so did you."
Faith grimaced at the memory. "Yeah, you never see the shiv that has your name on it, until it's too late. But you don't belong down there. I was surprised to find out that I didn't either." She slowed her spectral horse to a slow cantor, as the landscape around them changed, shifted without rhyme or reason. Within a minute, the yawning chasms, lava floes and terrible stenches of Hell gave way to a pastoral meadowland. Soft green grass, tall trees lush with leaves, the most incredibly blue sky that Buffy could ever remember seeing. Buffy was awestruck at the beauty that surrounded her. Even her own body seemed more real, more beautiful than she could ever remember it being before.
"So this is Heaven?" Buffy asked. "Didn't think I'd qualify."
"It's your heaven, B," Faith explained. "Yeah, you qualified, but not quite yet. Me, I'm surprised that I didn't land head first into Hell. They sent me to Purgatory. Kinda the waiting list for Heaven. I guess I'm your Virgil for the time being."
"Virgil?"
"Dante's Divine Comedy," Faith explained. "The only decent book in the prison book cart. I read it three times. Wicked powerful stuff. This Virgil dude gave Dante a tour of Hell, then he took him to Purgatory, where Dante's ladylove took over and showed him around Heaven with some saint dude." As she spoke, she stilled the horse to a dead halt.
"Rather simplistic summary, Faith," a calm voice added, "but not too inaccurate." Ben walked alongside the horse, looking quite comfortable for someone who Buffy just killed. "Don't worry about me, Buffy," he said as he helped her off the horse and onto her feet. Faith dismounted her horse quite easily, and walked alongside the beast. "In order to control Glory, the Powers That Be bound her to me. We inhabited the same body all these years. When you destroyed her, you freed me."
"Glad to help," Buffy replied, her confusion evident on her face. "But what am I doing here? No way I made the cut for Heaven, is there?"
"You sell yourself short, Buffy," Ben smiled. "But you're only here to visit. Besides, someone wanted to see you." He pointed over Buffy's shoulder, and Buffy followed his arm, seeing across the field.
A woman in faded blue jeans and a pink blouse walked toward Buffy. Buffy strained to make out features, but as the woman came closer, her soft honey-blonde hair and warm smile caused Buffy's breath to catch and a huge lump to form in her throat.
"Hello, dear," the woman greeted Buffy when they were a few feet apart. Buffy stood there, shocked, unable to move. She couldn't bring herself to believe that this miracle was true, until the woman raised her hand, and touched Buffy's cheek with a tenderness, and smiled with a sweetness, that could only mean one thing to Buffy.
"M-Mom?" Buffy stammered, tears filling her eyes. Her mother only nodded her head, her smile a beacon of hope.
Buffy fell into the arms she thought would never hold her again, crying out the anguish of the last few months. All the burden that she had carried since Joyce Summers died came crashing down around her, and she wept openly, unable to do anything else.
And her mother was there to comfort her, as she had done a thousand times before.
And for one brief moment, all was well in Buffy's world.