ok i'm a week late on updating. between school and they another round of the ever fun 'Bug caught a cold bug' i'm way behind. so here's the first half of chapter 6, it's kinda rushed so i may have to redo some of it later. don't know when i'll get a chance to sit and write so now idea when the next update will be. thanks for all the feedback, one of these day i really will to person replyes i swear.
Chapter 6: Tales from the Other Side
“Dear Lord!” Giles exclaimed as he watched Willow and Tara entered hands intertwined.
The Englishmen then did a double take as Soul nearly floated through the door.
“Hi Mr. Giles.” The spitting image of Tara, only see-through, smiled lopsidedly and waved.
“Dear Lord!” Giles repeated.
The little ball of energy that was Spark zipped around Soul and circled the older man before hovering at eye level. “Hi Giles!” the ball chirped. “It’s good to see you, well not actually SEE you, cuz really I don’t have any eyes , or a mouth for that matter, which makes me wonder how I can talk, and oooh breathe, am I breathing? I don’t have lungs but I need air to talk right? So I must be breathing! Just the no lungs kinda of breathing.” The ball floated off, deep in babble mode as Spark tried to self analyze the abnormalities that came with being a little ball of green light.
Giles removed his glasses, cleaning them furiously. “Dear Lord!”
Buffy looked at the group rather smugly. “See! I told ya!”
“Great googley-moogly!” Xander had just come through the door with Anya on his arm and saw two Taras.
Anya focused on the more transparent through of the two. “Tara’s a ghost!” The ex-demon then saw a nervous Tara seating next to Willow at the research table. “Ahhh Tara’s a zombie!!!!” Anya jumped behind Xander. If a Zombie Tara was going to eat someone’s brains she’d have to eat Xander first.
Spark zoomed up and bumped into the bottle blonde. “Come on Anya she’s not a zombie! Does she look like a zombie to you? She’s blushing!” Indeed Tara was hiding her rosy cheeks behind her hair. Unfortunately Anya’s hysteria was far from done.
Anya screeched, stumbling back against the door. “Xander there’s a ball of Willow attacking me. Call it off before it electrocutes me!”
“Oh as if!” Spark huffed and stomped off, which was quite a feat for a little light ball. “Probably would have liked it anyways.” She mumbled.
“Anya, do sit down so that, this… odd… scenario can be explained to us. I highly doubt Tara is either a ghost or a zombie.” He turned to Buffy. “Correct?”
The slayer shrugged as sat down, looking at Soul and Spark pointedly. “Let’s find out.”
Spark began bobbing back and forth across the room as if pacing on the floor. “Well ok it like this, see we, Soul and I, are from an alternative dimension, so are Kitten and Mistress, those’s are the two skanky look alikes you met earlier, only see we’re actually from the same dimension. Oh, but not yours…”
Soul reached out and caught Spark in her hands like one would a lighting bug. The babbling ball became muffled.
“Perhaps,” the ghostly blonde spoke, amusement twinkling in her blue eyes. “I should tell them before you have them completely confused.”
And muffled “Ok” sounded from her cupped hands.
Tara leaned in to whisper to Willow. “Lest we know the babble is spread over dimensions.”
Willow cough lightly and scratched her check, she would have blushed if she could have.
Soul gently released Spark before turning to the others. “We were just like you two once.” She nodded towards Willow and Tara. “Willow was a vampire, but yet she wasn’t. A demon was there, but, so was Willow.” Soul eyed the two. “Do you know why?”
“Um well,” Willow looked between Tara, the Scoobies, and Soul. “I have a soul?”
The ghost blonde nodded.
“Impossible! She can’t have a soul! It doesn’t work like that!” Buffy stood angrily.
“It d-does when you have a s-soulmate Buffy.” Tara spoke softly, staring into her counterpart’s eyes and seeing the truth.
“Sou-w-what?” The slayer looked lost. Vampires weren’t suppose to have a soul, to say otherwise just wasn’t, natural.
“Oh OH! I know this one!” Anya raised her hand as if in class. “I know this one! I know this one!”
“Yes Miss Jenkins.” Spark spoke sarcastically.
Anya made a face, she didn’t like this Willow any better then the other one. “Well I heard once about one of two soulmates getting turned, only they kept part of their soul.”
“Because not all of it is theirs to loose, part of it belongs to their soulmate.” Finished Spark.
Willow nodded, deep in thought, then the implications of what she heard started to hit home. She turned to Tara. “You’re my soulmate.” A slow beautiful smile spread across her features.
Tara matched the smile with a watery one of her own. She took the redhead’s hand and placed in over her heart before doing the same to the vampire. “I’m your soulmate. A part of your soul is m-mine and a part of mine is your. We’ll be t-together in this life and the next.” In that moment only the two of them existed in the room. They only saw each other and for the moment all the horrors vanished, but only for a moment.
“So Willow really did loose her soul, the only part that survived was the part belonging to Tara, fascinating.” Giles said, his gaze then landed on Soul and Spark and sudden their names registered to him for the first time. “Spark and Soul, spark and soul; Tara’s soul and the spark of Willow left after being turned. That what you are, yes? You’re Tara and vampire Willow’s souls!”
Soul smiled slightly and nodded her head. Spark bubbled excitedly! “Yes! I knew Giles would figure it out before we could tell him!”
Giles had the good graces to blush.
“So the little annoying green thing is Willow’s essence? Figures.” Anya grumbled.
“Hey!” Both Spark and Willow said together. “Like you’re such a great catch!”
“Yep they’re both Willow.” Xander smirked, before hiding behind Soul after the look he received from the redhead in corporal form.
“Wait a minute! Ok I kinda sorta get what’s up with them.” Buffy flapped her hand in the general direction of Willow and Tara. “But these two,” she indicated Spark and Soul. “I’m not getting. If they’re ‘souls’, why are we seeing them? Why haven’t they passed on? Are they ghosts? And just where did they come from?” Everyone started at the slayer. “What? Hey, I can ask intelligent questions if I want too!” The blonde folded her arms and pouted.
“Yes of course you can.” Soul said soothingly. “And to answer your questions,” Soul sighed and looked to Spark who bobbed back. “Like I said we use to be like your Willow and Tara. She was a vampire but I held on to her soul. Willow and her demon had came to an understanding. In fact it seemed the longer we were together the, less evil the demon, who we called Thorn, became. As if Thorn and Willow were merging.”
Everyone turned to look at Willow. ‘
Um, I think they want an answer from us. So it would seem, what are we going to say? I don’t know, do you, ya know, feel less evil like she said? Well I guess maybe I don’t feel as inclined to rip out their throats as I used to be…except Anya, no change there. Well good…I think. You sure you want to tell the slayer bout us, bout me? I don’t think we’re going to get much of a choice.’
“Willow? Rose?” Tara asked gently.
“A sorry. We were have a, um, meeting of minds. Yeah Rose says she feel less, ah, evil.”
“Rose. I like that name better. How come I didn’t get a demon named Rose?” Spark pouted.
Soul cupped the droopy light ball to her check before looking to Tara. “It’s time to tell them, you know that right?”
The blonde sighed and nodded, ducking her head forward to hide behind a curtain of hair. “He t-t-told me I’m part d-demon.” Various “what”s popped up through out the room.
Willow held her hand tightly, her eyes wide. “Tara, baby, what?”
Some part of Tara couldn’t help noticing Willow had called her ‘baby’ and it filled the blonde with warmth.
“M-my father. H-he said I’m part d-demon, t-that all t-the women in m-my f-family were. T-that is where the magic c-comes from.” The blonde lowered her head so she couldn’t see the disgust she knew would be on the Scoobies’ faces. “The d-demon will t-take over on my 21st b-birthday.”
“That’s why you were looking for a spell to exorcize a demon, to rid yourself of your demon side.” Giles stated.
“Well now that’s just silly.” Anya snorted. Everyone turned to look at her. “Demons don’t just take over on some certain date. You either have one or not. And this whole only women thing? Blah, they tried that already in Salem! Close minded superstitious males, boy I got to heap the vengeance in those days.” A look of glee covered her face as she remembered vengeful act of years past.
“Ann, hun, kinda scary now.” Xander squirmed.
“What? You’re saying that Tara can’t have a demon in her?” Willow asked.
“That’s exactly what she’s saying and for once I’m agreeing with her.” Spark replied. The light ball zipped over to them. “See we know for a fact that Tara has no demon what so ever.”
“I’m not a demon?” Tara’s eyes were so full of hope it was heart wrenching.
“You’re not a demon.” Soul confirmed.
“B-but how? H-how do you know?”
Soul smiled sadly and floated forward, blue eyes connected with blue eyes. “Because I found a spell, but it was dark magick, black.”
“N-no, I wouldn’t.”
“But you did, I did. The night before our birthday, and when I did, the only thing I lost was my soul.” Soul closed her eyes in remembered pain.
“There was no demon to exorcize so the spell separated her soul from her body.” Spark picked up the story. “Which of course also meant the bit of me she held was torn from my vampire self. Tara’s soulless body became an empty vessel that the black magicks poured into. The results, as you saw, was the creation of, The Mistress, as she likes to call herself now.”
Willow and Tara looked at each other in shock.
“As for the Kitten, well without me she became you usual soulless vampire.”
‘That submissive little skank is what I’ve would’ve became without you? ah I think so. Well thank God for small favors, I like being on top. So not going there right now.’ Willow focused again as Soul spoke.
“Mistress and Kitten became quiet a destructive team, they need to be stopped. Mr. Giles from our dimension was able to find a way we could reverse this, but we needed to find a dimension that was as close to ours as possible only before Tara did the spell. We’ve been traveling through space and time to find that ever since.”
“Unfortunately Mistress and Kitten have been following us every step of the way. See if they can find a way to destroy us, then that’s it. No moving on, no next life, or heaven, or anything, and no way of stopping them. The souls of Willow Rosenberg and Tara MaClay would cease to exist. ”
TBC...
~Bug
"They kill mice." - Tara
"You've been sporked by the Midnight Sporker!" - Me