Oh no
Autumn chair spinning for 18 hours is a no-no.
Thanks
Xita - yeah Tara is going to have to untwist herself... VW has no desire to do so...
Okay Kittens - Part 54 below. You know how on TV people get hurt and they are fine the next week (well most people) well not so here.
Aftermath.
Enjoy.
Katharyn
--------------
Title:
The Sidestep Chronicle – Visiting Hours (Part 54)
Author: Katharyn Rosser
Feedback: Constructive criticism always welcome.
katharynrosser@hotmail.comSpoiler Warning: Pretty limited. The story occurs in an alternate universe though reference is made to events that occur in both realities.
Summary: The aftermath of the destruction of the Master and what that might mean.
Disclaimer: I still don’t own any of the copyrights or anything else associated with BTVS. All rights lie with the production company, writers etc, etc. I am making zilch from this series of stories.
Rating: 15
Couples: None
Notes: After the battle with the Master I need to start to rack things up again.
Thanks To: Jo for spending her time in lovely Harrogate so productively.
The Sidestep Chronicle
Visiting Hours
By
Katharyn Rosser
“A sundae on Sunday, now
how perfect is that?” the Mayor asked her cheerfully. He was always cheerful of course, but today he had more reason to be so than most. Even though she hadn’t bothered to call him with the news until late in the morning.
The Master was dead and she hadn’t told him. There had been Faith. There had been Mr Giles and Jenny.
Willow.
And he had understood.
All he done was to admonish her, in a concerned way, for failing to inform him that the attack was to have gone ahead the previous night. But it had seemed for the best to keep him in the dark. There were too many variables already at work for her to start worrying about his idea of assistance. Or his feelings. Besides he would have worried about her. He really would, and that was one more thing she could do without running round in her mind last night.
People being concerned about her… it gave her an obligation to them to come back safely. And when she and Faith had set out last night, neither of them had really believed that was going to be a likely outcome. That they would both come back, more or less intact.
It had seemed impossible.
She smiled at him over the spoon that she had slipped into her mouth. There had been no stopping him from paying up on his agreed reward though. The circus… that was coming at Halloween. Just next week… he was really pulling out all the stops for that party. Most of Sunnydale would be oblivious to the true reason for the celebration, but somehow he had both found a circus and persuaded it to perform in Sunnydale.
In just a few hours. She was constantly amazed by him. And he, evidently at her success. Three times now he had asked her if she was sure that the Master was dead, that his minions were scattered. That his bones had been ground to powder. ‘He’s a tricky so and so,’ he had warned her. And she had reassured him that the skull was now just so much powder and parts. Scattered along the route from Mr Giles’s apartment to her own home.
There was no way that the Master was ever going to come back. Even if he had anyone to help him do that. There had been Willow… but who else knew the ritual?
So they had come out for ice-cream. Just as he had promised her all those weeks ago.
He always kept his promises and he expected the promises that had been made to him to be kept. That was the damn problem. Okay so Faith was not here having ice-cream with them, but had that ever been very likely? Err no. The Slayer was in the hospital, kept in by the doctors after being taken there last night. Jenny had taken her there as she had filled in Mr Giles. Someone had had to. And the hospital was where Tara was heading after finishing here with him.
“And you’re fine too,” he continued.
“Faith’s in the hospital,” she pointed out. It was not a total success. On a scale of dead to… not though, it wasn’t so bad. But he knew that she was there. He knew that Tara was worried about her friend. He knew that the Slayer had been hurt. He had even done the concern thing, arranging for flowers to be sent – although she had impressed on him that there
really shouldn’t be a card. He’d actually seemed a little surprised that the Slayer and her Watcher would not appreciate his congratulations on their success.
She had pointed out the reasons, politely, but he had still not quite understood. They didn’t trust him. They knew what he was. What he wanted.
Just as Tara did.
‘One thing Tara,’ he had said, ‘has nothing to do with the other.’ He really thought that their success was Sunnydale’s success and as Mayor he should be thanking them for that. And maybe, maybe he wasn’t so wrong. She knew that he really did care about the town and its people. But he couldn’t expect those that didn’t know him quite as well to appreciate that. Knowing what else he cared about…
She knew him too well. She knew his love for the town and she had let that cloud the fact that… in thirty-seven years he was going tear it apart to feed himself.
How could she set that aside?
Faith was really, really going to hate the flowers. They just weren’t her thing at all. And that was what made it funny. With the Slayer injured they all got to take care of her. Faith was going to hate that even more than the flowers. If vampires got sick she imagined that her attempts to take care of Willow would go down about as well.
They were both self-reliant. Strong-willed and intolerant of fussing. But it was for her own good. With her leg busted, as well as the injury to her shoulder, there was no way that Faith could really go home just yet. Nothing broken, but the tendons or something… Tara had heard them snap. She had heard the joints pop.
She wondered if Faith liked the grapes that she had bought for her? It was the least that she could do… she had sort of staked the Slayer in the shoulder herself. So now, in her current state, Faith could put up with some fussing and care from the people who loved her. And Tara was already looking forward to patrolling tonight. Seeing what effect their action of last night would have had on the town and its monsters. She had to take up Faith’s slack, at least until the Slayer was fit. That was all that had stopped her leaving the Mayor already.
That and having no idea how to tell him that they were through. They had to be very soon. What other reason was there to stay with him?
Aside from the fact that they had accomplished everything that their agreement had specified, aside from the fact that she and Willow would have no where to stay when she did that… aside from the fact that she had to cover for Faith… there was so little time left.
For her.
She had no time.
Funny that she should feel that she owed him anything at all, but would she have been here now without him? Would the Master be dead? Would she have found Willow?
Yes… they would always find each other…
But would she have found Willow
already? And in time? Maybe not and that… now that there was not much time left she couldn’t imagine life without the vampire.
What if she had been too late? What if she had never known, as a human, what she had managed to find with Willow… deeply flawed as it was?
In a very real way he had given her that. He had brought her to Sunnydale. He had allowed her to find Faith, Jenny and Mr Giles. They had helped her to impose justice. She owed him enough time to find someone new to help… she couldn’t just disappear could she? And she had to cover for Faith… to help the town through the aftermath without people dying. She still hadn’t even told Willow what was coming. Warned her. Asked her. Held her for cool comfort. Her birthday was so close… too close.
Too little time to live… and now she had to keep patrolling as well… when all she wanted to do was to be with Willow.
But she owed that time to Sunnydale. Not even to him.
She owed the people here… because she had let Willow keep on killing them. And she couldn’t let anything else do that could she? Just because her own personal goal had been achieved.
She cleaned out the bowl, and he passed her an extra napkin with mock admonishment for her messy eating. But it was his talking that had done it. Everything had got all melty, fluid and sticky.
“So no more Vice-Principal Snyder?” the Mayor asked after she had cleaned up.
“I’m… I’m afraid not. He was…” she paused, “I have no idea how come he was there.” That had been very strange. Snyder had lived in Sunnydale long enough to know the rules. He had preached them at the High school.
“He was…” the Mayor, in his turn paused, searching for the right words.
“A toad?” Tara ventured, hating herself immediately for speaking ill of the dead like that. That wasn’t who she was.
A spade is a spade Tara. Shut up Daddy. I’m done with you.
He smiled, seeing her reaction. “He was good at what he did. His people skills left something to be desired I will admit. I wonder who the school board will get?”
She knew that he knew that she knew that his word on that subject was likely to be pretty much final. Maybe he would listen to her word. “M-maybe, they could think about promoting Dr Gregory?” she ventured, hesitant to put her opinion forward, but the science teacher was just about the antithesis of Snyder. Concerned about the development of the pupils. Stern without being an ogre. Confident enough in himself that he didn’t have to overcompensate and take his frustrations out on the kids.
“The science teacher?” the Mayor checked with her. She nodded. “I was sure that if you would venture an opinion on this you would have suggested your friend the computer teacher.”
She smiled. Jenny was a good teacher, a great person to have as a friend. But she was not yet Vice-Principal material. Sunnydale High needed Dr Gregory. In her humble opinion. And the fact that the Mayor had not realised where she would place her opinion pleased her.
It really did. He didn’t know her half as well as he thought he did. That would be proved in the next couple of weeks. She wasn’t looking forward to that though… it was about so much more than surprising him.
***************
A week later“Hey y-you,” Tara forced a smile as she entered the hospital room. She had never been a fan of hospitals, but this one was much better than any she’d been in before – sort of like a hotel. But with wheelchairs and bedpans. The Watcher’s Council must have had a really great medical plan. Either that or Giles was paying and she didn’t think he that he was likely to earn enough as a librarian.
“Hey there,” Faith looked up, obviously glad to see her visitors as they came into her room, then smiled and allowed Jenny to go over and hug her. “Ouch, watch the shoulder.”
“Sorry,” the teacher apologised, virtually jumping backwards.
“It’s okay. That’s nearly fixed… I’m already wowing the docs with my ‘astounding recuperative powers.’ Just a flesh wound really, less muscle damage than they thought. Deep… but nothing that won’t heal up quickly.” Faith leaned over as far as her injuries would allow in Tara’s direction, whispering as if in a conspiracy. “You know Tar there’s a nurse here that gives me sponge baths and I’m pretty sure you’d like her. And she’d like you.” Faith grinned, her mission accomplished as Tara blushed and Jenny looked at them grinning to herself.
“We brought gifts,” Tara told her, changing the subject quickly – especially given what Faith now knew; the thing they had never discussed, that she had never tried to explain to the Slayer.
“More gifts?” Faith asked. “You brought gifts last week… is it my birthday?”
“I don’t think so… but if you don’t want them…” Jenny picked up the bags she had carried in and turned as if to go.
“No… You know me, I’ll take them… and you know like… thanks.” Jenny handed the bag over and Faith opened it up. “Gee books… because you know that I’m very much like the big reader gal here who went back to school.”
Tara just gave her a patient smile.
“You should look at the titles,” Jenny told her.
“Some of them have… p-pictures,” Tara added. “Just don’t tell Mr Giles.” Jenny shook her head in agreement with that instruction. Definitely not Mr Giles territory. They would not go well with tweed – and the reasoning behind them? He just wouldn’t get it.
“Why, what did you buy me?” Faith asked, suddenly more interested again and opened up the bag and pulled one of the larger books out. “Oh.”
“We thought,” Jenny started.
“Jenny thought,” Tara corrected her, not quite willing to share the responsibility for those.
“I thought,” the teacher continued unphased, “that you might have to look a long way from home to find stuff you might not… have tried yet…” She watched as Faith flicked through the pages of the book, turning them around to check on which way up they should be.
“Well I haven’t tried that…” Faith confirmed showing them a double page spread and still wondering which way up it should be. “At least not recently.” She grinned and Tara rolled her eyes. “Just what I always wanted… an instruction manual. And ooh look,” she turned to another page, “One that only needs one foot on the floor. That could come in very handy,” the Slayer said gesturing at her injured leg. “Thanks.” She smiled as Tara continued to blush. “And what’s this?” she asked reaching into the bag again.
Faith drew another book out of the bag. “That’s mine,” Tara told her.
“The Guinness Book of Records.” She looked at Tara and Tara looked right back at her, daring her to make some comparison to Jenny’s gift. “This year’s too. Thanks girlfriend… I’m sure it’s full of fun facts to know and tell.” The smile seemed genuine though.
“Not as much fun as mine,” Jenny said quietly as if there was a friendly rivalry going on. And there really wasn’t.
Tara conceded the point to her and sat down on the edge of Faith’s bed, careful to pick her good side – and conveniently placing her coat over Jenny’s choice. Just in case of incoming doctors and nurses. “H-how’s the leg doing?” she wondered, knowing now about the shoulder.
“About a day better than the last time you asked me. I’m still hell on wheels.” Faith gestured to the wheelchair in the corner of the room. “And I can get myself in and out of it easier now.”
“Still another week then?” Jenny asked. “Before you can come home?”
Home. Faith had a home there. With them. That was a good thing.
“They don’t know… they reckoned it should take me a month to fix that leg, but you know Slayer constitution and all. The docs don’t understand it but they reckon if I keep going like this about a week in here yeah then another couple of bed rest to let it heal up. A few more of taking it easy.”
“That’s good, you know, because I can’t wait for you to get out on patrol again,” Tara told her thinking it was a friendly thing to say, then realising it sounded as if they were having trouble without her. “Not that we need you or anything – out there I mean. I just mean, you know, that I can’t wait till you’re back to your old self. All mended.” That sounded much better.
“Is it heavy out there?” Faith asked, sounding worried despite the reassurance.
Tara looked at Jenny who nodded, she could talk ‘shop’ to Faith. “Not at all,” the younger woman said. “In fact… it’s pretty quiet.”
“But you’re
still racking up kills?” Faith asked.
Tara nodded.
“Well I’m not sure that’s fair. I mean here I am lying in bed when you didn’t get more than a scratch and a bruise and you get to up your kill count – and there’ll be nothing left for me. What’s the score now anyway?”
“You guys keep score?” Jenny asked, not sounding as if she quite believed it. Or wanted to. Tara could understand why but the rivalry had stayed friendly and seemed like a good thing.
“We’re playing for big money – we got fifty each on this,” Faith told her as Tara looked embarrassed again. “So what’s the score?”
“Two forty nine to one ninety seven,” Tara admitted.
“You’re just one away?” Faith asked. “You said it was quiet out there.”
“It is… but you know they were easy kills too,” Tara told her, a little ashamed of leaping so far ahead and trying to find reasons for it. It was hardly Faith’s fault that she had been injured.
“Guess I can kiss that fifty bucks good bye,” Faith said just as before Jenny coughed to alert them to the entrance of the nurse who came to rearrange Faith’s bedding and check on her.
Of course when Tara lifted her coat up to get out of the way, Faith looked absolutely innocent and was silently seeming to pin the ownership of the book on Tara – at whom the nurse obviously glanced as behind her back Faith pointed and grinned, mouthing ‘She’s the one.’
Tara just blushed all the more and wanted to say… exactly what Faith said a moment later. At least the first part… Not that she needed Faith’s matchmaking at all.
“Actually she didn’t bring me that,” Faith said meaning Tara. “It was her…” She pointed at Jenny who had the decency to blush herself. “Tara isn’t into that sort of thing at all are you Tar?” Faith asked and received a glare in response.
“No…” Tara said quietly to the nurse. “I brought her the Guinness Book of Records.”
And did the nurse care at all? No. She just looked curiously at them all, as if they were all mad – which she had to know about Fiath by now – and a moment later left without verbal comment.
Faith just broke down in laughter which Tara watched until the Slayer laughed so hard it started to hurt and finally subsided. “You know Faith,” she joked “I’m glad that I’m going to take your money off you.”
Always play to win, Tara. Yes sir I always do, but you can shut up now. I’m all grown up.
Willow said so.
“So one-ninety-seven,” Faith said. Tara nodded. “Does that include all the ones from the Bronze?”
“Actually no. You were counting?” she asked, though that could only help her count… unless Faith could say that she got fifty-three and Tara knew that wasn’t true. That many between them maybe.
It had been enough to get it done.
“I lost track,” Faith admitted.
“Mine didn’t include those either,” Tara told her.
“So you already won?” Jenny asked, trying to clarify the result.
“I had extra chances that you haven’t had, you know. So we could… go back to where we were?” Tara suggested not wanting to take Faith’s money simply because she was down.
Play to win, Tara. Yes sir… but I’m playing fair too and I told you to shut up now. Okay then Tara. If that is what you want.
Yes Daddy. It is.
“Nah… I got tagged. If you’d have got wounded and crippled,” Faith pretending to play for sympathy, “I wouldn’t have given you a break. Not a chance in hell of that. Let me know when you get number two-fifty, though I might have to owe you.”
Tara smiled, obviously Faith had no money with her – not that she even intended to collect. Maybe… maybe for charity. She wasn’t going to need money herself soon.
“I lost big to Bob in geriatrics last night,” Faith told them. Tara just shook her head. “You should be thankful we weren’t playing strip poker… I mean in this outfit, one bad hand and that’s you naked. And you know.. wrinkly up there.”
“It might have perked them up?” Jenny suggested wickedly.
“You talking of perking up reminds me, where’s Giles anyway?” Faith suddenly asked, realising that her Watcher, for the first time since she had been in here, wasn’t in the visiting party.
“He had to stay back at the apartment and write some report for the Council,” Jenny revealed. “Nothing to worry about… he sends his love.”
“Cool, I guess he’s finally letting them know the good news T… we cleaned out Sunnydale. He’s gonna make you a star!” Faith said holding up a hand for Tara to slap.
Reluctantly Tara did so. She wondered what additional news might be in that report given what else she had done. And what was still to come.
--------------------
Making Tara a star wasn’t exactly what Rupert Giles had in mind. He had to be honest and completely accurate for the Council. Complete being the important word there.
His report had taken a good few days to write simply because he hadn’t really bothered about writing one before, so that had meant that he’d needed to include everything since Faith’s arrival in town, set out in the proper order and context.
The main point of the report was, of course, to chronicle the destruction of the Master. It really was quite a coup. Several Slayer’s and with them several Watchers, had met their end at the hands of the Master over the centuries. But now he was gone and it was his Slayer – Faith – who, with a little help, had accomplished that goal. It made somewhat of a mockery of the Council’s reluctance to hear his earlier requests for assistance.
The problem was that he couldn’t leave anything out of the report. If he mentioned Tara’s assistance – and that he had accepted it after his initial reservations – then he would have to specify who she was. The Council was very specific about that sort of thing. They always wanted details. Everything in context. Everything in its place.
And that, naturally, meant revealing for whom she worked. That, he feared, would not go down too well, when he went on to specify exactly who Richard Wilkins was and what role he had played in Sunnydale’s unusual history. Not that the Council was likely to be unaware of it – even if they had failed to brief him on the situation when assigning him to the town nearly five years ago.
Quite aside from all of that, there was a far bigger problem of which he had only recently been made aware. Tara, it seemed, was
involved with a vampire. Quite how something like that should come to pass he had no idea, and he found it hard to believe that Mayor Wilkins could be entirely pleased with such a turn of events, given his own problems with that particular breed of demon.
It was obvious that Tara hated vampires but from Faith’s, somewhat, reluctant report it was clear that she, Tara, also believed that she was in love with one of them. Quite a quandary. Drawing the information from his Slayer had been unusually difficult. Faith had only mentioned it at all only as a passing humorous remark under the influence of pain-killing medication and then had fallen silent when questioned more closely. She had, eventually, seen that this was something that he – and the Council – had to know and it had changed the entire tone of his planned report.
At one point, prior to the discovery, he had been considering making a recommendation that Tara be considered for an official Council position in Sunnydale. Something that might get her out of the clutches of Mayor Wilkins. The vampire situation changed everything. How could Tara be considered for a position with the Council – or really even trusted – when she was allegedly in love with a vampire? He wasn’t even sure that it was possible to love a demon like that. Certainly a person might
believe that they loved a vampire – and who was he to say different? That was the effect that vampires had upon humans. But the reverse? Was it possible for a vampire to know anything beyond base lusts and desires?
The hunger?
Could a vampire love?
And even if it could, did that make any difference at all to his report?
Willow might be the compassionate, loving and caring ‘person’ that the world had never seen. She might be perfect for Tara and Tara for her. Giles was prepared to concede that if shown the evidence that their
relationship actually worked. Unfortunately that was hardly the issue was it?
Willow was still a soulless killer. A demon. A murderer of every kind of human she had ever come across. Apart from Tara. A beast without mercy.
She, with her ‘friend’ Xander, had killed Nancy. He had watched as they had drained Cordelia Chase. For all her faults that girl did not deserve such an end. No one did. And they had done it just to taunt him.
Not even for the hunger.
Not even for food.
They did it… Willow did it… to hurt him. To provoke and enjoy his reaction.
How could he not include that beast in his report – no matter how much Tara had done for the people of Sunnydale? There was no way that he could ignore it. None at all. The report had to be complete and accurate.
And so it was.
He scrawled his signature at the foot of the document, carefully folded it and placed it the envelope he had prepared. Stamps already affixed for London. Within the week it would be on Quentin’s desk and entered into the archives.
He sighed, feeling a little dirty. A little as if he had betrayed a trust.
But he really hadn’t.
***************
by forrister » Sun Jun 23, 2002 4:11 am 
But yeah Tara wants VW so badly she'll twist what she sees to make VW more like the lover she needs. But even so VW is stirred deeply probably as much as a vampire can by Tara and her obvious, yes I dare say love for Tara seems to guide her behavior. Ultimately she is a vampire and that struggle is what we are in for.
at: 6/24/02 12:21:17 am
Well, Bobos Mom, knowing that I made you laugh is a high compliment indeed. 
