From Ashes ✗ Stiles Stilinski - Chapter 59: Chapter 59

"It's been a long road getting here. For you. [...] There has been achievement, joy, good times. And there has been grief. There's been loss. Some people who should be here today...aren't. But we are. Journeys end. And what is a journey? Is it just.. distance traveled? Time spent? No. It's what happens on the way, it's the things that shape you. At the end of the journey you're not the same. Today is about change. [...] You ascend to a higher level. Nothing will ever be the same.
Nothing."
- Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Graduation Day, Part 2
☽ † ☾
"Come on!"
"No."
"Please?"
"No!"
"I swear it won't kill you."
"Stiles."
"Humor me just this once. I'll never bring it up again."
Maddie grimaced. "Orgnac."
"Did you say the name or did you just throw up?" Stiles said with a grin.
"What? I was twelve!" Maddie shot him a glare as they walked, narrowly avoiding a tree branch. "And she was a half orc. Orcs are supposed to have names that sound like throwing up."
Stiles took a moment, perhaps considering her logic - or the logic of the preteen version of her.
"A female half orc named Orgnac," he said squinting in front of him as Maddie wondered if he was picturing it. "I'm guessing you weren't a bard?"
"Barbarian."
"Ax?"
"Scythe." Maddie shrugged. "It was a horror campaign. Xander DM'ed."
"I didn't know you were such a nerd." He was watching her again with that look - somewhere between astonishment and pure bliss. "Wait, what's your opinion on Star Wars?"
Maddie was sure he was flirting - or at least his version of it. He still stumbled and hesitated with actual compliments, like the words were too big to pass through his throat. She wasn't one to talk though; compliments, both giving and receiving, felt like exposing all the softest parts of her.
Before she could answer, they reached the clearing and a small group of people gathered there at the edge of the woods. Maddie's eyes caught on the dead grass and blackened earth beyond them and she wondered if her blood was staining the dirt she was trampling.
There was a flash of strawberry blonde hair and Lydia was in front of her, annoyed and expectant. "And where were you two?"
"Nowhere," Maddie said at the same time Stiles choked out a response.
"Got lost."
"Mmhm." Lydia narrowed her eyes, not as if she was upset but more like she was suspicious. Maddie folded her arms and looked at literally anything and anyone but Stiles.
She still caught Stiles in her peripheral as he meandered over to Scott.
"What was that about?" Lydia said, which was enough to call Maddie's attention back to her. While her voice remained curious, there was a sense of knowing on her face Maddie could feel the warmth of blood rushing to her cheeks.
Maddie's shoulder more twitched than shrugged. "What? It was nothing."
"I'm sure it was," Lydia teased, the hint of a smile on her face. It wasn't like the smile the girl forced onto her face the day they met, but also Lydia hardly seemed like the same person.
"Now that you're all here, we can get started!" a voice rose over the idle chatter, English and incessantly chipper. Slowly, Maddie and Lydia joined the group that seemed much larger up close. Aside from Maddie, Lydia, Scott, and Stiles, Derek stood next to Isaac and Max bridged the two sides as if there was absolutely no tension.
Maddie looked around for anyone else.
"What about Allison?" she asked.
Max's eyes grew large as they fell on Maddie. "She's, um, not going to make it."
Maddie did her best not to feel relieved. She didn't know how to feel about Allison and bad blood can't be wiped clean with one good deed. There was a jab of guilt that followed as she eyed Scott, who kept his gaze on the ground.
He stayed quiet for a moment, his gaze distant. "...They're leaving."
Maddie wanted to apologize for her relief suddenly, if for no other reason than what that could possibly mean for Scott and his relationship with Allison.
Max heaved a sigh and walked to the center of the group. "Anyway-"
"How exactly do you plan on doing this?" Derek cut in and Max didn't seem surprised in the least. "My mother died protecting us from the vampires, how will this be any better?"
Max held up her hand like was answering a question a teacher asked. "If we look at the spell technically, it requires a sacrifice of blood from someone powerful enough to be deemed the town's protector."
"So, like Scott? Maddie?" Stiles asked gesturing to them both. Then he gestured to Derek with a deadpan look. "Maybe you if you get your head out of your ass?"
Derek edged toward Stiles and Maddie was already moving, like it was automatic. Like she was already itching for another fight. She kept her arms folded as she stepped between them and stared Derek down. He narrowed his eyes at her but stopped anyway.
Maddie heard Stiles release a breath somewhere behind her. "Thanks, Mads."
"Oh no. I just want to get through this without incident." Maddie turned around, giving Stiles an equally incredulous glare. "On top of that, an Alpha werewolf bite would be lethal to me. If you keep instigating, I'm going to sit back and watch him kick your ass."
Stiles' eyes darted behind Maddie, where she imagined Derek with an almost smug expression.
"Got it," Stiles said with a poor attempt at casual.
"How much blood does it need?" Isaac asked like it was a perfectly natural response.
"There's not actually an amount listed in Ancient Sumerian, mostly because it's Ancient Sumerian, but..." Max examined the paper in her hand and looked back up, eyes scanning over the group. "Enough to count as one human sacrifice. With all of us together, it should be enough."
"Hold on, what?" said Stiles. "We're the blood sacrifice? Are you insane?"
Maddie felt absolutely insane. It was a crazy plan and there was no telling if it would work or not. All she had was vague telling of the Hale fire casualties and an inkling. "The spell needs blood, but it never said from one person."
"Are you sure?" Scott asked, like a confirmation from her was worth something.
Maddie hesitated and glanced to Lydia for some confidence. "I ran the numbers by Lydia. She seems to think it's enough."
Lydia gave a non-committal shrug. "Barely, but it should be."
Maddie tried not to let that shake her already wobbly stance on all of this as she looked to Scott, who took a deep breath and nodded. "Okay."
"Lydia knew?" Stiles cut in.
Maddie turned to him and answered like it was obvious. "I had to run it by someone."
"And that someone wasn't Scott or, you know, me?" Stiles was still more panicked than annoyed and with good reason.
"Because it involved Math and Lydia's a genius," Maddie said, biting her tongue when she nearly added, 'And I don't think I've seen either of you study once in six months.'
"You had to know he'd react like this," Lydia said quietly and Maddie just just in time to see her rolling her eyes.
"Like what?" Stiles' words got faster like they were speeding up to his anxious thoughts. "A sane human being who doesn't participate in blood sacrifices?!"
"Actually, more along the lines of a babbling idiot," Isaac added, his tone as casual as his slouchy stance.
Stiles was already glaring at him. "I want you to know I really don't like you."
Maddie shot Isaac a reproachful look and he seemed unphased, shrugging it off.
"We're not creating a barrier, we're reinforcing it and this may be our only viable option." Max's voice was loud and practically solid in the way in grounded everyone. "If there was a bloodless way around it, we'd do that but there isn't."
"And you're sure this'll work?" Derek asked her and not Maddie which only managed to spike a childlike irritation.
Max's nod was minuscule, hardly even there. "It's just a cut on the hand and squeezing the blood along the energy field near the ashes until the seal is complete."
"Then let's get this over with," Derek said and it was almost a compliment how he took what Max said at face value.
Max began digging through her bag when Maddie looked down at her hands, finally clean of cuts and bruises. The scars that were there were pale and from a time long before she was a slayer. She absently wondered if a cut like this needed to be deep or mystical, if it would last. She could do without any more scars.
"Are we sure there isn't a better, non-blood-related answer to this?" Stiles asked, his voice thin as he bargained.
Maddie eyed him flatly. "Stiles."
"Okay, I don't know if you remember this," he started in a rushed whisper as Maddie heard the sound of a pained grunt, "but I'm not great with blood."
Scott came up behind him and placed a hand on his shoulder. "Stiles, it's okay. Focus on something else."
Stiles sent Scott a deadpan stare.
"Something else beside all the bl..." his voice faded as he turned and saw something behind Maddie. Maddie turned to see what happened and saw Derek's hand sliced open and covered pooling with blood. "Beside all the...oh god, I'm gonna pass out."
Maddie whirled back to a very pale and woozy Stiles, stumbling back. She reached out and grabbed his arm. "Stiles? Hey! Look at me. Focus over here. Can you do that?"
"Yeah," he said, shaking stupor away and looking at her, but not fully. His eyes darted in a way that made her think he was struggling not to follow the knife.
In all seriousness, she was just as riled up by the dagger, a reminder of all the ways she wasn't better. There were still ghosts living in the maze of her mind, blending with the shadows.
Maddie sensed someone walking closer behind her and Stiles eyes were no longer on her but something over her shoulder.
He grimaced, fear and nausea playing on his face in equal measure. "Oh my god. Did we have to bring the big knife?"
He was going to pass out if he didn't look away and there was probably very little to deter her attention.
Maddie took a breath and thought about all the people there, weighing how much their opinions mattered to her. The ones that did wouldn't care and the ones that didn't mean she wouldn't care. Stiles was still eyeing the blade and it finally came into view at the corner of her eye as Max wiped it clean with a cloth.
"Stiles!" Maddie said with as much authority as she could muster.
He glanced at her for only a split second, annoyance somewhere under his panic. "What?!"
Maddie hated public displays of affection. She hated the idea of people seeing how much she cared. Elliott wasn't a fan either but maybe that was more because he didn't deem her worthy of public acknowledgement. Even Marie was meaner when they were surrounded by people. Maybe Maddie didn't like it because no one else did and it was easier to hate whatever everyone else hated than to be the outsider.
It didn't matter. It wasn't about her.
Maddie pulled Stiles to her by his neck and her head warred with her senses when she kissed him, the warm, tingling hum of electricity on her lips the moment they were on his. It was far from the first time she used herself as a distraction, but typically the context was much different than this. Distracting a kanima or the vampires was the closest thing she ever got to actually strategizing; distracting Stiles was a less elegant process.
He was even less prepared than before and she pulled so quickly that she might've slightly headbutted him. She wasn't necessarily gentle this time around either - which sent every nerve ending into high alert so quickly, she was sure she was experiencing some sort of whiplash.
She worried she was being more than a little rough and tried to edge back, but one of his hands was on her back keeping her close - something she was incredibly aware of.
Apparently, he had much less of a PDA issue than she did.
What was she doing again?
Right. Distracting Stiles from...something.
Maddie realized again that only one of his hands was on her back but in an instant it was gone and he tore himself away from her.
The world rushed back into her consciousness and she turned to see a knife stained with blood in Max's hand. Her vision focused on the slice of red on Stiles hand.
"Holy sh-" Stiles was mumbling before he glared at Max. "Ow!"
He was about to look down at his hand - which was covered in blood - when Maddie maneuvered in front of him again.
"Don't look at it," she ordered, her voice more stern than pleading. "You're going to faint. Do not look at it."
Stiles drew in a breath, wincing as he raised his eyes to just about anything but the cut on his hand.
Maddie held her hand out to Max as the knife was wiped clean again. In one swift motion, Max swiped the edge of the blade along Maddie's palm. It felt like a sting, then a burn, then a horrible ache when she tried to close her hand into a fist.
At some point, Lydia appeared beside her with a smug smile and raised eyebrows.
Maddie rolled her eyes.
"Well, that's a new development," Lydia chimed in and that was exactly what it sounded like. Airy and light and mildly annoying like wind chimes.
Maddie shrugged. "I don't know what you're talking about."
Maddie eyed Stiles who was meandering over to Scott and holding up his injured hand by the wrist with the palm facing up. Scott had a hardly repressed smile despite the cut on his own hand and held out his uninjured fist low enough that maybe he thought he was being subtle. Maybe Stiles thought the same thing when he fist-bumped Scott with his free hand.
Those nerds.
Lydia's eyes squeezed shut and she took a sharp breath as Max cut open her hand.
Max walked over to the edge of the woods and bent down, examining the spot in front of her before pointing to it. "The ashes are still here."
"How can we be sure of that for the rest of town?" Isaac asked, red already dripping from his hand.
"There's this surge of energy that happens." Max wiped off the blood one last time and wrapped the knife before placing it in her bag. "We'll be able to see it working...I think."
In slow realization, they all made their way to the line of ashes in the grass.
Max nodded to Maddie, who was the first to let her palm tip and the blood drip to the ground. One by one, each person around her did the same, except for Max who smoothed out the paper in her hand and began to speak. Her tone was so unlike her normal voice, Maddie thought for a second how Willow would shift from soft and upbeat to a mountain, solid and immovable, in a typhoon of magicks and energy.
"Utu grant us light
May the ashes of our enemies
Cast out their kin
The sun recognizes this
Life binds our words"
The ground under Maddie's boots trembled, only a murmur of an earthquake.
"Enki grant us protection
May the power of our blood
Shield our people
The earth recognizes this
Sacrifice binds our words"
The rumbling grew more violent as thin lines of glowing warmth spun up and away from the ground where the blood pooled atop the ashes. Tiny threads of pure light unspooled and crossed as more shot up from the ground.
Something about felt off, though. The threads stopped multiplying and began to dim.
"With life, this land is bound
In death, our children live"
It dimmed and dimmed until it was barely a glow, woven like a fence.
"What's happening? Why isn't it working?" Max said but Maddie was sure it wasn't directed to anyone in particular.
Maddie looked around at the line of seven people and down at the blood dripping as she squeezed her fist tight. Lydia said seven would be barely enough. Her eyes followed the line down to the end where Max stood with her paper, hand not outstretched or cut.
"Max," Maddie shouted, watching Max studying the paper like she was missing something. Max's head shot up and Maddie nodded toward the fading barrier. "We need you."
"What?" Max said and it was genuine confusion. She glanced from the barrier to Maddie.
"It's not enough," Lydia voiced piped up.
"No, I'm not..." Max was wide eyed but Maddie wasn't sure it was out of fear. "I didn't save the town."
"What do you call this?" Maddie asked, irritated as she gestured to the glow of the barrier turning from bright white to the red ember of a lit cigarette. "You held the line. That counts for something."
Maddie remembered the fireball Max used to help them get away and hoped Max remembered too.
Max looked from Maddie to the barrier, eyes going up and up. With a shaky breath out, she shook her head not as if she was trying to say no, but like she was trying to shake something out of it. Hesitantly, she reached back in the bag and started chanting the spell all over again but with a quiver in her voice.
She unwrapped the knife and held out her other hand, saying the words to the incantation with more and more fervor, almost like they were words of encouragement to herself.
"The earth recognizes this, sacrifice binds our words," she repeated, slowly bringing the knife to her hand as she approached the barrier. The glow of it was getting brighter with every word, the criss-crossed lines turning the light into a glowing lace around them. She never took her eyes off her hand as she dragged the blade along her palm and winced.
It was surprising that she remained so stoic when everything else she did told Maddie differently. She recalled Victoria Argent on that final day - suffering silently and sharing something with Maddie that she didn't have to share. The proud lioness. An ex-Watcher of a long dead council, aiding a Slayer the only way she knew how anymore. Maddie hoped that was the only trait Max inherited from her family.
"With life, this land is bound!" Max shouted, squeezing her injured hand into a fist as the blood dripped down to the ashes and her face screwed up into an expression of agony. She probably never did anything like this. She was new, after all. "In death, our children live!"
More threads shot up from the ground, weaving through lace and filling in every empty space as everything around them was washed in white light. It was like the sun, like daylight surrounded them as the ground shook.
It burned brighter and brighter, blinding until something blew Maddie back, off her feet in a gust of wind solid as a brick wall. She fell and rolled along the ground as the light finally dimmed.
When she could finally see, her eyes adjusted just in time to watch a similar gust of wind bend the back in the distance, across the open field.
Maddie glanced around for everyone else and found a similar situation for the rest of the group as they all looked around from their places on the ground. Her eyes landed on Max who was both gaping and smiling so wide as her eyes traveled all around her. Her eyes stopped on Maddie, who was still full of questions. Max's eyes were bright and full of life. Maddie wondered how Max could know or if she could feel it.
Things did feel different though. Something about the empty space that glowed and stitched together just moments before felt strangely whole, a feeling she only knew as a child when she ran from a classroom and the warmth in her bones became the invisible armor around her. It didn't scare her this time.
Relief filled her up but there was a sadness to it, something like letting go.
Her mission wasn't just over, it was complete; Allison was leaving and the town was protected. There was nowhere left to run.
It was time to go.
☽ † ☾
No one talks about how rare goodbyes actually are, how often they are denied by time and pride. No one likes them but we never think of how valuable they are until we've lost the opportunity entirely. Maddie was denied plenty of goodbyes already and nearly did the same to others. She wanted to think about it like it was a good thing, like it was worth noting how rare a chance it was just in case she never got another chance.
She woke up in a motel room hours ago, the same shabby place close to the main street that contained most of Beacon Hills. The shower was awful and the complementary mini shampoo and conditioner dried out her hair. The drive, she learned, was to the Argents' home.
She never did collect the rest of her stuff.
Maddie threw the rest of her clothes that were hanging in the closet to the open duffel bag and, for a moment, allowed herself a moment to acknowledge what she was doing and all that came before. It was surreal, like wherever she was took place outside of reality - but change always felt like that.
There was so little of her here, like she hardly existed in this house. She was a ghost drifting in someone else's world - a world not meant for her. She zipped up her bag with the last of her things and walked out into the hall, more than happy to leave the room behind.
The hallway walls were bare now, nails jutting from their smooth surface. The walk to the end of the hall was its own punishment as she considered going faster to avoid eye contact with the people left here. She managed to get to the steps.
"Maddie."
Maddie froze and thought about not turning around. She considered leaving with not a word said between them and that didn't bother her very much at all. Still, there was a part of her, duty-bound and more aware of how the fight the other night went down, that knew better.
Maddie swallowed down her pride as dropped the duffel bag and she poked her head in to see Allison sitting on her bed with Max beside her. Maddie said nothing and stepped carefully into a bare room with little more than a stripped bed and a black dresser with missing drawers.
Allison stood up abruptly and the motion made Maddie stop in her tracks. Allison reached behind her for a moment and Maddie didn't catch what she was doing until Allison was facing her again. Her hand was out and Maddie's confusion pushed out any other emotion.
She glanced down at Allison's hand and her breath caught. She thought she lost it.
A jagged piece of wood, smoothed and pointed. Almost a lightning bolt. For a second, an image of the slayer from Sunnydale - the one that appeared as a mirror of Miss Morrell - came to mind. Maddie remembered the pain in her eyes and the world she never got to see. She would ask Buffy about her, she decided. There was a story there, with that stake and those words she said and Maddie hoped it was one she was ready to hear.
She eyed Allison, not altogether sure what was happening.
Allison's eyes were trained on the stake as she swallowed. "It doesn't belong to me."
Her eyes finally met Maddie's and Maddie understood as the meaning eased into her thoughts, a bottle washing to shore.
Maddie took the stake and the curve of it felt like a makeshift handle. She glanced up at Allison and said nothing. There were no words that would make sense or that she was willing to give. All the bad was still there, a bubbling tar pit ready to pull her down and burn her, skin to core. Instead, she nodded and Allison seemed to understand as she nodded back.
Allison went back to packing and Maddie was about to leave when Max stood, smiling too much like her second grade teacher whenever she aced a quiz. Motherly and warm and too enthusiastic. Just like the first time Maddie saw Max, Maddie eyed the hand she was offering.
It was bandaged.
She took it briefly with her free hand and gently squeezed with a small smile and a nod. All Maddie could hope for was that Max and Allison could balance each other out while they looked for a way to get her back to normal. That they were more than where and who they came from.
For a second, Maddie thought of Sadie and the memory was more of an incessant itch than an open wound. Sadie was still missing but staying would mean she was right - she would have her nemesis. Sadie wasn't worth the energy and Maddie was sure it would burn Sadie much more to leave things as they are.
Maddie let go of Max's hand and quietly left the two behind.
At the end of the hall and across from Maddie was Chris Argent.
"Got everything?" he asked.
She sighed and it was a forced gesture. "I think so, yeah."
Maddie quickly zipped the stake into the bag and picked it up again.
"Thanks for letting me stay here, I guess," she said with far less humor than she meant. She still had the other night on her mind when she tried an appreciative smile. "Thanks...you know, in general."
"Thank you." His expression softened just barely. "Good luck, Madeline."
Maddie took a deep breath and turned, descending the stairs. The large front windows were open and the curtains were missing but the whole downstairs still had a flowery scent to it. The windows displayed the front yard and she caught sight of Buffy and Xander chatting idly. If anything, this was the most familiar thing - seeing them talking and wondering what they were saying. The Camry was parked by the sidewalk, a dulled beige thing with a dent by the back tire. If she recalled, the back windows no longer rolled down properly and she grimaced.
At least she could sleep the whole way if Buffy didn't immediately grill her.
Maddie scanned the rest of the area and her stomach felt like lead. Scott and Stiles weren't here yet.
She made her way down the steps and turned, seeing Lydia type something on her phone. Maddie tried at a soft smile. "How's Jackson doing?"
Lydia jumped and her head shot up. When she saw Maddie, she exhaled and slumped her shoulders. "About as well as anyone."
"So, he's freaking out."
Lydia made a face like that much was obvious. She took one look at Maddie's bag and put her phone away. "Is that the last of it?"
"Yeah."
"Please tell me you folded the clothes before you threw them in there."
Maddie paused, wide-eyed, before forcing out, "Yep."
Lydia's stare was deadpan for longer than a standard beat. Her face cracked and she laughed quietly, shaking her head. "How are we friends?"
"...You let me sit at your table?" Maddie said with a shrug.
"As I recall, that was hardly my choice."
"I was the first person you saw after Jackson dumped you?"
"I wasn't-" Lydia stopped, sucking on her teeth as she gathered herself and laughed. "It doesn't make any sense."
Maddie's brow furrowed as she reached for any meaning her words could have.
"We hardly hung out. We barely know each other at all. We don't even like the same things." Lydia's face turned pained and Maddie was at a loss. "And I am so tired of your world."
Maddie frowned and thought to apologize. It was true that she hardly hung out with Lydia towards the end and they had next to nothing in common, but there was a connection there she couldn't explain. Maybe it was supernatural. They still had no idea what Lydia was and what that could possibly mean for a slayer. Still, the connection was there and Maddie only just noticed how much it was hurting.
Lydia met her stare in teary eyed frustration. "So why does it feel like I'm losing someone?"
Maddie set her bag down and hugged Lydia, only now realizing she was losing the two people she spent the most time with in the past school year. Lydia hugged her back but if she was crying, Maddie couldn't tell. She wanted to be better at this part - the 'friend' thing. She wanted to do better. She couldn't afford any more Maries or Allisons.
"I mean, you could always visit," Maddie forced out and it sounded flimsier than she meant it. "Open invitation."
Lydia chuckled and let go, the tears still brimming in her green eyes. "Well, I have to."
"Why's that?"
Lydia sent her that look - the queen bee reclaiming her crown. "Are you serious? Who else would make sure you don't wear the same outfit everyday?"
Maddie rolled her eyes and laughed as the said their goodbyes. Before she made any other promises, she picked up her bag and headed toward the front door.
Walking onto the patio, Maddie spotted Terra standing with Buffy and Xander. She adjusted the strap of the bag that dug awkwardly into her shoulder and approached the three.
Buffy noticed her first. "Hey, you need help with that?"
"Nah, I got it," Maddie said. Whatever her current relationship was with Buffy, she wasn't entirely ready to accept it. Buffy smiled tightly and nodded.
Xander nodded to Terra. "You gonna be okay on your own?"
"With a fancy new rental and the open highway?" Terra asked. "You're right. Sounds like a recipe for bad time."
Both Buffy and Xander gave her a look.
"What? I'll be fine. Better than fine." Terra took a deep breath, exhaling like she was practicing deep breathing exercises. "I might even be relaxed."
With an earnest shake of her head and the beginnings of a grin, Buffy turned and headed for the car, Xander following. Terra's eyes made it to Maddie and there was the smallest edge of a smile there.
"Alive and kicking?"
Maddie shrugged, hand flying up to the wound on her neck. It was still scabbed over but not entirely healed and the raised bumps where the two punctures were made her shudder. "Alive, anyway."
"Baby steps." Terra adjusted the bag in her hand, eyes deliberately downcast. "It was a close call. If we didn't get there when we did-"
"But you did." There was a full stop in Maddie's tone, a calm and resolute ease on the brakes. There was no rage left there, but also no fear. "Not every slayer has someone in their corner when they need them. I got lucky."
Terra's brows scrunched in. "Stop doing that."
"What am I doing?"
"You saved a whole town. You were dying and you still chose this place. Take some credit for once." There was an edge in Terra's tone, something hard and familiar that Maddie once found endearing if not spiteful. The expression on Terra's face cracked and softened just a bit. "Sorry."
The word was unfamiliar from Terra, who owned who she was with such confidence and severity, 'sorry' was nothing short of a miracle despite the smallness of the slight.
Maddie was already wishing she would take it back. Keeping it there between them was proof that something changed and she was so, so tired of readjusting and contorting everything about herself to accommodate change. "You don't have to-"
"No, Maddie. Listen." Terra paused, gripping Maddie's wrist with her free hand. No one else would hear the plea there; anyone who knew her would hear the dip in her tone and the very edge of a crack in her voice. Maddie knew her and the truth of it was a storm ripping through her. This had nothing to do with the other night. "...I'm sorry."
Maddie was frozen for a second and a whole year managed to pass between them in the span of a breath. Only Xander ever said he was sorry for her as he held her back in the rain that night. Death was commonplace and no one else thought to even pity her loss.
A year of suffering in silence.
Even saying it once was reliving it as if time wasn't a linear thing. Like it was a budding ache and every part of it bloomed in her chest at once. She nodded, deciding all she could do was accept it and keep going.
They wouldn't hug; they would probably never hug. Maddie didn't mind.
Terra let go of her arm. "See you at HQ."
"Yeah," Maddie said so quietly, she barely made a sound.
Terra's eyes shifted from Maddie to something over her shoulder and the rumble of an engine grew louder. The clock in Maddie's head never stopped moving and the carousel kept spinning. Maddie turned around and set down her bag as sunlight gleamed off the windshield of Stiles' jeep and the engine cut.
Maddie was already moving toward it as the two boys she's seen or talked to nearly everyday since she showed up got out of the car. She didn't focus on what Stiles was saying but decided to enjoy the white noise of the two going back and forth, the comforting familiarity of it.
The hardest thing for her to do was not run over to meet them. She kept a normal, even pace, her hands stuffed in her jacket as she approached. Mid-sentence, Stiles tripped on the curb and just barely caught himself and she couldn't help the grin on her face.
Maddie greeted Scott first, mostly to stave off the worst part of this whole thing. "I didn't get to say this before, but nice plan back there the other night."
"You too." Scott smiled and glanced back at the Argents' house as it faltered. Somewhere in there, Allison was packing and whatever story he might've thought they would have was over. There was a distance in his eyes but not an altogether hopeless expression. "You think we're safe now?"
Maddie thought about the edge of town and healed cuts on both of their hands. Somewhere, beyond the border, Lilith and the other vampires were still there. Maddie thought it was foolish, even now, to give them any sort of mercy but she made a choice; now, as expected, she had to live with whatever happened next. "I don't know about you but I don't think we're ever safe."
"But we're still here," Scott said. "That has to count for something, right?"
Maddie's smile tugged wider and she hugged him. He reminded her of Jack in a way, not in any personality traits but she liked to think her brother would do anything for the people he loved. It was an admirable trait he and Scott shared - without question or ulterior motives. Just a good heart. "Call if you ever need help, okay?"
"I will."
"Promise me."
"I promise." Scott eased away from her with a reassuring smile, despite it not reaching his eyes. "We'll be alright."
Scott backed away as if bowing out. Giving her space as she turned and saw a similar expression from Stiles as she saw from Scott. A smile that barely lifted half of his mouth, a forced gesture. His brows, though, were drawn in and his eyes held little light in them.
She didn't say hi or wait for some defensive snarky remark. She moved in to hug him and he was there to meet her, wrapping his arms tightly around her as she buried her face in his neck. There were so few goodbyes she got to properly have but they weren't easy and she never wanted to say them. She couldn't remember any place she ever lived that took her in so easily; that quietly and completely made sense. She imagined a world that would allow her to stay.
Maddie wanted to memorize this if for nothing else than to find a way back somewhere on the other side of the end of the world. If there was still a world, she would come back but she couldn't say it.
She thought of her brother and Marie and knew not to make an empty promise.
"I'll text you, okay?" he said, voice soft and words rushed.
Maddie nodded, the words rumbling against the crook of her neck.
"Like all the time. You're gonna get so sick of me, I swear to god."
She laughed but it sounded like crying. Was she crying again? This place really must've broken her.
"And I'll call. You can yell at me whenever I do something stupid."
"But I can't yell at you all the time," she finally said and it sounded weepy.
He laughed.
Maddie said nothing, knowing what needed to happen next. She pulled away from him only slightly and, gods, she wanted to kiss him again. She wanted stupid conversations and quiet rides home every night. She wanted him to know that he saved her life - not just in the obvious way. He was her friend first and before anyone - the first person, maybe ever, who allowed her to be herself even when she wasn't sure who that was. He said she belonged here and maybe she didn't believe it until then. Whatever he was to her now, he was her friend first - probably the best she had in a long time.
She was too aware of the moment, though - too alarmingly aware of Buffy and Xander and Scott. Of time and how it was already growing between them. She was right before, in the haze of her spiked punch - his eyes were the color of dark rum, like something liquid she could easily get drunk on. His pupils were dilated and she wondered for a second how she looked to him. The night before felt like a dream and morning had found her, the day bringing with it so much more to do and a war in which she would have to fight.
We go to war every night.
Maddie swallowed. "I'll let you know when we get there."
Not home. San Francisco was never home.
"Yeah." The word was full of empty defeat.
Maddie stepped away from him, jarred by how cold it left her. Without another word, but with a final glance, she turned, forcing herself forward and not looking back again. The duffel was already in the car, probably due to Buffy. They were both so stubborn.
Maddie got in the back seat and Buffy and Xander were already there and buckled up in front of her. Still chatting, something she couldn't catch over the thick layer of fog in her brain. Somewhere behind her, Stiles and Scott were still there and Lydia was maybe saying goodbye to Allison. Somewhere behind her, Max was busy being a Watcher and planning out her new life as if it was something she was able to map out and talking Chris Argent's ear off. Terra would probably pass them on the road later, blasting her playlist of anime opening and ending themes that she thinks no one knows about.
Sadie would be far behind her.
Peter wouldn't be able to threaten her.
The engine rumbled to life and some offbeat 90s indie band played quietly from the speakers. The car started moving and Allison's house was washed away in a blur. They turned again and again as the music hung in the air. The school, the sheriff's station, all of it rushed by and Maddie closed her eyes to block it out.
Her phone buzzed in her pocket and she reached for it.
2 New Messages
Maddie unlocked her phone with an immediacy that bordered on emergency.
Group MMS
Lydia, Scott, & Stiles
Lydia ➔『Booked. Second week of June. 』
Lydia ➔『 I so needed a vacation. 』
Maddie was grinning already as more messages started popping up.
Scott ➔『What's going on 』
Stiles ➔『 What vacation?? 』
Lydia ➔『 You didn't extend the offer to the boys I see. 』
『 HQ is a secret. 』
Maddie was typing as fast as she could to keep up, her grim thoughts ebbing for a second.
『 Can they even keep secrets? 』
Stiles ➔『 hey 』
Lydia ➔『 Not well. 』
Stiles ➔『 HEY 』
Scott ➔『 idk if the jeep can even make the trip. 』
Stiles ➔『 i'm right here you know that right 』
Stiles ➔『 i can see what you're saying 』
"You okay?"
It was both a shock to hear anyone speak and to see that it was Buffy.
She touched the scar through her shirt, realizing she couldn't remember the number of days that might've passed since the night her whole life changed. Maybe the days kept living after that were more than time in between.
"Huh? Oh. Yeah." Maddie tried at a smile but it faltered when the stare Buffy fixed her with didn't leave. "What?"
Buffy's face was expectant, if not a bit smug. "Remember that fun conversation we had? The one about you explaining. No time like the present."
Maddie's text conversation fell to the wayside as the present met her like a right hook. "Right."
Buffy's eyebrows raised as she waited and Xander kept quiet, which Maddie was both thankful for and affronted by.
Maddie sighed and reached behind her neck with both hands, unclasping the thin silver chain and untucking the charm from inside her shirt. She held the cross out like an offering, as it glinted in the passing light. It shouldn't exist. "Here. I think this is yours."
Maddie expected a haunted glance, something like seeing a ghost. Instead, Buffy's eyebrows scrunched in on her forehead, confusion there as she examined it. "A cross. Not that I'm not grateful..."
She didn't remember it, of course she didn't. She was in her early thirties; how much do you lose in a decade and a half? Maddie wondered if even the important things, the things you want to remember, eventually blur and fade. "You tore it off in the school library and quit because you didn't want to die."
So matter-of-fact. Blunt bricks thudding to the floor, presented without any sense of understanding. Maddie liked to think she understood better now, did she?
The expression Maddie was looking for before was there now, falling over Buffy's face - a darkness there. A shadow. Her eyes were wide as they met Maddie's. "...How do you know that?"
This was coming for a while, a weight in her stomach she was so aware of now that it made the words stick in her throat. She was a child, going where she wasn't allowed to go and unable to understand that tools weren't playthings until the damage was done.
"The spell we used called for the ashes of what came before. Turok'han ashes." Maddie swallowed, feeling awkward as she continued to present the cross to Buffy. "They only place I knew to get them was Sunnydale."
The car jutted, like the brakes were hit by accident instead of the gas pedal. Xander's voice was questioning, without a hint of amusement. "The crater? You went there?"
"No. Sunnydale, the town." Maddie said to Buffy's scrutinizing stare. Maddie didn't look away. "I was in the town, I saw it."
Buffy looked down at the cross and the emotion there was something Maddie couldn't identify. For a second, she was sure it was fear but not quite.
"Maddie, there's no way..." Buffy was examining the cross, focused on the charm before she pursed her lips took a deep breath before redirecting her stare to Maddie again. "It's gone. There's nothing left."
Maddie's eyes narrowed, still feeling like a child, like she was told the monster under the bed wasn't real. In movies, they never believe the kids until it's too late. She had to make Buffy believe before it was too late. "Then why do I know about your cross? Or that there was a giant snake demon? Or that Miss Morrell looks exactly like a slayer that died? Or about that evil preacher you cut in half?"
"Okay, woah, slow down. The Hellmouth is closed. As in kaput. We destroyed it," Xander said, his confidence on shaky ground as he spoke. He threw a glance to Buffy and added quietly, "We destroyed it, right?"
"Look I know it's a giant crater now. I'm not crazy, but something's still there." Maddie noted the shudder in Buffy's shoulders at the word crazy but didn't have time to ask. She took it as proof whatever she was saying was working. "It was like it knew me. It said...Caleb said that something was coming. The leader of the vamp cult said it too and..."
It was only then that Buffy gingerly took the cross from Maddie's grasp and examined it closer. Maddie was shaken again, remember the horrors churning around in her head. The decayed hollowness of headquarters. The broken scythe. Planes raining down like the sky was falling on the empty city streets. Too much to process. Too much she wished she didn't know.
"What? Maddie, what is it?" Buffy's voice came back to her.
Maddie's throat was dry and she knew if she said it out loud, there was a better chance that it was real. That it would become real. She started digging for the stake, unable to remember the right pocket it was in, zipping and unzipping the sides. When the words left her, they were quiet but frantic. "I saw it. I don't know if slayer dreams are real or not when you're dying but..."
She opened another pocket and something rolled out to the floor, tiny and only vaguely familiar. Hers weren't the only eyes that followed it.
"What's that?" Buffy asked.
"Oh, um..." Maddie strained to reach it, a white marble she maybe kept in her jean pocket and forgot about. She turned it over and the memory came to her in a crash. "My friend found it when we were attacked. I guess a female vampire was there, went by the Mother. The vampire cult leader guy brought her up a few times but I don't think I actually saw her."
Maddie turned it over and Buffy reared back like she was slapped as the doll eye looked up at them.
Xander was fidgeting in his seat, suddenly concerned. "Buff, what is it?"
Silence. Thick and stifling.
Buffy offered her other hand, the one without the cross, waiting for Maddie to drop the glass eye into her palm. When Maddie did, it was a hesitant motion and when it made contact with Buffy's skin, there was a barely noticeable twitch. A shiver, like the ghosts that passed through Maddie in the depths of the haunted school.
The quiet stretched as if time stopped.
Buffy's eyes darted back to Maddie's in a motion that almost made her jump at the suddenness.
"They never talked about what she looked like?" Buffy said, her voice low and not quite frightened. Spooked, maybe, like a rabbit at a loud noise. "Or how she talked? If she had an accent?"
"No, but he didn't make a whole lot of sense most of the time," Maddie said with an ever-stretching frown as the questions began to alarm her. "Something about an angel with burnt wings and a beast with three heads."
Angel. That was another topic she wanted to bring up but now wasn't the time as Buffy paled.
"An angel?"
The word came from her with a heavy but familiar ease. A range of emotions Maddie only vaguely remembered from her fight with Caleb.
Maddie nodded with a slight jerk of her head and stared at eye, the color pale, almost a grayish blue. A color she knew from somewhere but it was in a fog. The last week went in a blur, from the moment she was captured by the vampires until now.
In a jolt, something came back to her. The color, coming to her out of a haze. Not blue like Marie's eyes in the flash of lightning but something just as haunted. Wide and hypnotizing.
"Wait." Maddie search the memory, the one blur by panic and the feeling of sinking, pulled further and further from consciousness. The pain and gore of the rest of the experience overshadowed most of it, but how did she get there? Who caught her? "I was captured by them but the one that got me wasn't the leader. I...I think it was a woman and she had these huge pale blue eyes and I couldn't move. Not like I was being held because I wasn't but like I lost the ability. I don't really remember what she said but I think her accent was different than the others. Not Southern, more like..."
It was a whisper at first. Haunted. Airy light. There and gone.
"Look at me, dearie." Eyes wide and bright and then a pain in the back of her head before darkness consumed her.
"...English?" she said, just barely allowing the information to click together. She refocused on Buffy, whose gaze was distant and shaken. "Does that help?"
Buffy's hand closed into a fist around the eye. "Yeah. It helps a lot."
☽ † ☾
She mourned for days, sobbing as the moon bathed her pale skin and made her glow. He always told her that death made it all easier; that the only hurt left was the good kind. Lilith mourned and cursed the heavens. It wasn't until the second day that a shadow arrived, long and thin and washed in black velvet. Momma was supposed to come back to a celebration and she feared what horror this would cause her.
Momma wasn't always around. She liked to travel when Papa was a homebody, tending to the children and keeping her safe. She wanted to desperately to be like Momma - to speak like her, dreamy and accented, and move like her, like a shadow passing through trees. Like a cat, with purpose and easy precision. Momma was the best of them. Rumor was she once killed a slayer in one strike and didn't even bother to feed.
Momma was mean too, distant and showing up with different companions every time. None of them liked Lilith; she wasn't even sure Momma liked her half the time.
"Don't be silly," Papa would say with gentle chuckle. "Momma loves all her children."
Pain clawed at her chest every time she remembered he wasn't coming back. Her memory was full of him and every moment after that took up her headspace hollowed out a piece of her.
Maybe that's why Momma was so nice since coming home.
Maybe that's why she held Lilith and allowed her to cry, humming a song that made Lilith think of waking up brand new. Fearless and starving for life.
Momma, after all, was the one to make her brand new so long ago. Lilith woke up in dirt that night, gasping as the world came into view and dirt nestled her in. Just like now, there was jet black hair hanging above her and porcelain faces surrounded her, unblinking. She told Lilith she always knew it'd turn out this way, that she saw it.
In the beginning Momma used to give her lemons and told her to listen close at night. "The moon tells us secrets. Can't you hear it?"
Her voice would lilt, breathy and proper and manic, so different from Papa's which was made of gravel and earth.
When all this horror began, Lilith knew it was Momma's idea. She wasn't always around, but Lilith knew she cared about them. She always talked about wanting a family. She would do anything to keep them safe.
Now, she only murmured a song into Lilith's ear, stroking her hair as the porcelain faces surrounded them, the one in the center blindfolded with ribbon. Momma said that one had been impolite and must be punished. "Miss Edith ate all the cakes and her sisters are very hungry. She'll not have tea in the Tower when it's burning."
Lilith said nothing, because she hadn't said a word in days.
Instead she listened to her Momma's voice, soft and sweet and winding around her, wondering how much of a comfort it was to her when her mother sang it. Momma tried to get Lilith to sing with her but she couldn't gather herself enough to say the words or hold a note.
"Don't fret, dear heart. The wall is dry tinder and Mummy will punish the bad girls for what they took."
"But..." she croaked out. "But the Slayer..."
Momma gently raised her chin with a manicured finger. "The Slayer drinks deep the poison from the seventh cup. When the wheel spins and the jackal gets his prize, we'll have a lovely party with all our family."
It meant nothing because Lilith saw it as nothing. Pretty, hopeful words to ease her gnawing pain. When she didn't respond, Momma held her and she cried angry tears for so long she couldn't remember when it she did anything else. It didn't matter. Momma could have her plans so long as she kept singing to Lilith.
So long as Lilith could keep imagining the Slayer's throat torn open until she bled her dry. That would be enough for tonight.
"Run and catch
Run and catch
The lamb is caught in the
Blackberry patch..."
☽ † ☾
Venti Iced Americano. Blegh.
Venti Soy Vanilla Macchiato with a pump of Hazelnut.
There was a reason she had to write it down.
Max typically didn't walk into a Starbucks in her comfiest sweats but she assumed they were heading right for the airport, not making a stop at the edge of town. Sure, she didn't have to be the one who went in to order the drinks - there was a drive thru after all - but her Uncle was next door at the petrol station and the queue at drive thru was a nightmare. The least she could offer is to pick up the drinks while he and Allison waited to fill up. Besides, she loved the smell of fresh coffee in the morning - it was a comfort thing.
She was grimacing at the list, going over it again and again to make sure she said Allison's in the correct order without looking. She didn't want to sound like she didn't know how to order at Starbucks. Every person she overheard at the register sounded like a pro and some of the drinks were so much more complicated than the ones she was examining.
She adamantly offered to pay, which was a mistake. She only had the one credit card and it was secured with a whopping £200 limit, most of which was already used on a motel room. It wasn't like she had the excess money - her Grandmother didn't work anymore and being a Watcher certainly didn't pay what it used to pay. Chris seemed to clue into this and attempted to sway her, but when Max had her mind set on something, it was near impossible to change her mind.
Which was why when she noted the mint colored thermos on display, she was already losing her place in the very long queue and jumping to try and grab it. It seemed like a good idea at the time and she could use a decent thermos what with her Watcher duties getting in the way of any lazy morning routine. Mint tea in a mint thermos - if anything, she was coordinating.
She was also fairly short and, just like anywhere else, Starbucks shelves were not made for short people. She jumped again and swiped at the thermos, catching it just barely with her nail.
Yesterday, I performed a Magic Proficiency level five spell and now I can't reach a cup on the top shelf. Such is life.
"Need some help there?" a voice said somewhere behind her, close enough that she assumed it was pity from a stranger.
She turned but didn't acknowledge anything but a blur of a person before going back to what she was doing. "No thank you. I've almost-"
She swiped at it again and watched in horror as it tipped the wrong way and, like a row of loud, metal dominoes, watched as they fell, rolled and crashed to the ground in a cacophony. She stood there, arms still outstretched above her head and her shoulders raised to her ears and her eyes squeezed shut.
Max opened her eyes and looked around her, metal thermoses scattered in a pastel rainbow. She wondered if any of them had dings or cracked lids, if she would have to pay for all of them with her lack of money. The crowd of people stared at her, including the baristas who wore twitchy faces like they couldn't decide whether to laugh or scream. Her expression turned sheepish and her cheeks warmed as her shoulders drooped.
"Caught one," the voice from before said. Young-ish, deep, and probably trying not to laugh.
Max glanced up to the stranger with a thin but courteous smile. His expression didn't match her though; he was grinning in an easy way that made her think he might always grin. If nothing else, despite his frat boy appearance, it seemed sincere. Besides, the thermos in his hand was the exact color she was trying to reach and she took it as at least a minor win.
"Yes, well. That makes one that isn't potentially broken," said Max, gingerly taking the cup and softening the slight smile on her face. "Thank you."
Without another word she crouched down and started picking up the clutter of aluminium cups, checking the sides for dents and the plastic lids for cracks before craning her neck up to where they'd been before. It was a shame the most she could levitate was a pen. A hand carefully took the rose gold thermos she just checked and placed it on the top shelf. After a hesitant second, she began handing them off to him.
"A crash to the floor's nothing. Believe me."
"You say it like you know from experience." Max eyed him again. Conventionally handsome and clean cut, eyes shining with mirth and a smile that showed the world exactly how bright and perfectly aligned his teeth were.
The stranger placed the last cup on the top shelf and Max noticed how sloppily they were placed. He didn't seem to notice all that much as he moved to get in line again. "I've had my share of very public disasters, yeah. Former Starbucks barista. Empty cups falling isn't great. Full cups falling? Prepare for the first world problems brigade."
Max meandered over as well, her thermos still in her hands as she fought to keep her perfectionism to herself. "Thank you. Again, I suppose."
He flashed her another smile, throwing them out like they were closer to currency than a genuine gesture. "No problem."
Max checked the time on her phone and went back to memorizing the order. There were at least four individuals in front of her and she hated stumbling over her words in a crowd. Not that anyone would be listening. They didn't know her.
The man in front of her might though.
Being clumsy in front of strangers was one thing; being clumsy in front of pretty stranger reminded her of private school and wearing her makeup the wrong way or having toilet paper stuck to her shoe. It was a tiny thing but tiny things were always what her anxiety started out as.
She focused on something else as the line moved forward. For instance, what she would get to drink - which was something she hadn't thought about at all. When she examined the menu, she realized she never really ordered from Starbucks that much. Not that London didn't have their share of Starbucks, because they were practically at every corner, but that she wasn't normally able to afford a £4 latte daily. Besides, her grandmother always fixed her with a withering glance when she came home with paper cup after paper cup as a teenager when they had "perfectly good" tea available at in their kitchen "for free". The free part wasn't true obviously, but the idea was planted and grew over time.
The Mocha Coconut Frappucino sounded so sugary, it only managed to reminded her of her last migraine. In fact, most of the menu did. Chocolate and caramel and strawberry creme, all of them making her grimace. Of course, as she always managed to, she gave them all the benefit of the doubt as an idea popped into her head. He did say he was a barista.
"Have you tried the um...caramel brulee latte before?"
"Huh?" He looked around before his eyes landed on her and he pointed at his chest and Max, because she isn't blind, noted his t-shirt didn't hide the lean muscle on his arms. "Me?"
Max nodded with a smile, mostly for the fact at how dog like the response was. That's a bit what he reminded her of - a Labrador who just heard the word 'outside'. This was decidedly not the most flattering interpretation and she shook the thought away.
He glanced up at the menu and shrugged one shoulder. "Uh, yeah. It's good for a sugar high."
She was grimacing again. "Is there actual coffee in it? I'm in for a long day."
He squinted up at nothing in particular, his expression only slightly less confident. "I'm sure it's somewhere in there. Real talk though? Go for the Red Eye."
Max examined the menu again. "That's not up there. What is it?"
"Coffee with a shot of espresso. Tastes like hot ass but it'll keep you awake."
"Not one to mince words, I see."
He grinned and his whole face seemed to open up. His eyes went back to her for a second before redirecting forward. "Nah, I just got in after the flight from hell. I'm usually coherent enough to think before I speak."
"Oh. So you need a red eye after your red eye?" Max said with a cheeky grin.
"Ha. Funny."
"No, really. It sounds great. Nothing like quote 'hot arse' -" Just then, a woman ahead of them quickly twisted around to shoot them both a haughty glare. As she turned, she revealed a small boy with a wide smile and fruit punch stained teeth stare up at them as well. Max paled, gaping at the boy and the woman with awful blonde highlights. "Oh my goodness! I'm so sorry. I didn't mean-"
"Hot ass!" the child parroted.
The woman shot the boy a horrified glance. "Tyler!"
She sent Max and the stranger another glare and scooted the boy toward the register with a scowl as the line moved forward.
Max was still gaping like a fish on land. "I scarred him."
"Technically I scarred him," the stranger said almost proudly, earning him a deeply unamused look from Max. "What? Don't be embarrassed. He's a kid. I knew pretty much all the curse words before preschool."
Max gestured to the child as he and the woman moved toward the other end of the counter. "But..."
The stranger walked forward, another gleaming smile on his face as the girl behind the register smiled back, cheeks reddening already. Max rolled her eyes at his antics and wondered how many people fell for them daily. He seemed like the type of person that was simply handed things; as if all he had to do was smile and the world bent to his will. Who needed hard work and compassion when you had good cheekbones and a strong jawline and...
Her stare darted away and she could feel her face warming when she realized she was staring at his bum. At least she realized it this time; it was the one time the grumpy werewolf, Derek, broke his glare he was sending her uncle just to shoot her an 'are you serious?' look on the way out of the woods the night before.
"Miss?"
Max snapped to attention, focusing on the barista behind the counter. "Hm?"
The stranger was still standing there, gesturing to the register. "Did you need some coffee?"
"What? No! I mean yes, but..." Max held up the thermos. "I can't let you do that. I have this and three drinks. It's perfectly fine."
"You almost went into a frenzy for possibly ruining a kid's life on my account. The least I can do is use money to buy my way out of the guilt."
Max raised an eyebrow and his smile was softer than before, his humored reply nagging at her logic. She looked down at the thermos; she knew she couldn't actually afford it. It was more a gift to herself, for making it through more than she thought she could possibly endure. Succeeding in her first act as a Watcher. She didn't really want to give it up.
People were waiting, glaring at her, all except the barista and the stranger. Even as she continued to reason with herself that this was fine, her steps forward were hesitant, unsure.
When she finally ordered, it was quick but precise, like she always did this. Of course, she almost forgot her drink until the last second. "And...a red eye, I suppose."
She could see the self satisfied grin out of the corner of her eye.
They moved along the counter silently as they waited for the drinks. The stranger was making conversation with the other waiting customers and part of her was annoyed by it, if only for the fact that they responded instead of giving him odd glances. She envied him for how he clicked with everyone, something she always wanted.
Her need for validation from complete strangers was not exactly healthy but she couldn't help it.
His drink was up first but he stayed and waited for the other two paper cups and a mint thermos filled to the brim with black coffee and, presumably, espresso.
Max smiled to the barista who placed the lid net to her drink. "Thank you."
The barista gave a thin smile and went back to working. Max plugged the drinks into a paper carrier and screw the lid onto her drink before picking them up.
"Do you usually take advice from perfect strangers?" a voice said next to her. Max glanced at the man who saved her about £30 or however much it would've been in US dollars.
She sent him a grateful smile and quickly looked away. "On more than one occasion. And I wouldn't say perfect."
The stranger gaped and put a hand to his chest as if she wounded him. She let out a hiccup of a laugh, like she couldn't hold it down.
"So, just got here or getting the hell outta dodge?" he asked.
"Um, the second. You said you just flew in?"
"Sad but true." He sighed. "I have family in town."
Max gave a nod, glancing out the window and seeing the SUV just getting to the pump and her uncle got out. "Same for me. Well, I did. They're in the car at the moment, thus the multiple drinks."
The stranger gave her an expectant look, glancing at her thermos and back up to her.
It clicked in her head and she used her free hand to grab her thermos and popped the lip open as she gave him an uneasy look. "I'm trusting you on this."
He scrunched up his face. "That's probably not a great idea."
Max sent his a troubled looked before edging the cup to her lips. The moment ait hit her tongue the bitter punch made her face twist up and the coffee itself burned all the way down. "Oh, dear lord. That's disgusting!"
She sounded like she was retching as she said it.
"See? It's basically hot ass."
"It's hot ass, mom!" a tiny voice said. They both turned to see the woman and her son from earlier as the boy kicked his the table leg repeatedly. The woman gaped and shot them a seething glare.
Max choked on the horrible liquid.
The stranger smiled another winning smile pointed his thumb to Max as he kept eye contact with the middle aged woman. "You know, why don't I just help out my friend...um..."
"Max."
"My friend Max! I'm gonna help out Max with the door." He nodded regretfully to the two. "Ma'am."
Max and the stranger hurried out of Starbucks and the stranger laughed so hard he was holding his stomach. So hard, Max was laughing too, both a nervous and exhilarated sound.
"That was awful!" she said, trying to hide her smile behind her cup.
The man caught his breath and Max only then realized how genuine his laughter was this time. "I sorely disagree."
They stayed that way until their laughter finally died down and Max glanced back at the SUV just as Chris Argent was climbing back into it. She turned to the stranger and gave him a nod, with a toothy grin still on her ace. "Thank you for the assistance and the, ah...recommendation."
"If you're brave enough to go back in, you can always drown it in cream and sugar."
"I am certainly not brave enough for that."
"Well, it was very nice ruining a child's life with you, Max." The stranger held out his hand. "Good luck."
It was time since being in the states that she wasn't the first to offer her hand, which was nice. She took it. "To you as well."
They let go and he flash one last smile her way before heading to his car, which she noticed was a sleek red sports car - something that managed to suit him perfectly.
Max walked away and across the parking lot as an engine revved behind her and faded quickly. She got to the SUV and fumbled into the back seat, handing the carrier to Allison with a triumphant grin, feeling as though the day would be a good one.
As they drove from the gas station and out of Beacon Hills, Max pulled out her journal, if for no other reason than to mark the high point in her day. Good Samaritans are rare and she wanted to remember this one.
She took another sip of her coffee and made another face as it went down.
"Um, Max?" Allison's voice piped up.
"Hm?"
"Who's Jack?"
Max glanced up, confusion at the name. When she eyed Allison, she saw her tapping at the digitized name on the side of her cup.
Jack, she thought as a goofy smile stretching across her face. "A very pleasant stranger."
☽ † ☾
Two Days Later
It came to her in dreams. Nightmares.
An empty San Francisco, covered in thick ash.
Planes falling in surreal showers.
The pounding of hooves chasing her.
A beast will bear three heads. You will know them all by name.
A creature made of flame, burning. Its decrepit walk as if it disjointed and broke its legs with every step. The pressure of a scream pulsing inside Maddie's head as it passed through her.
Firestarter.
The cemetery, waiting for her.
A grave, waiting for her.
The sky cracking open.
No, not the sky. Something as big as the sky, moving in a haze of smoke and smog.
Looking for her.
Maybe that's why she implored to come here already.
No, that's not right. It would be so easy to say but it wasn't right.
"You sure?" Xander asked at the gate. They arrived early enough to see the sunset beyond the bridge and into the ocean, the skyline burning gold, then pink and purple, and finally the orangey-blue of night in the city. Never completely dark. Never completely at rest.
Maddie lifted the sleeve of her leather jacket enough to show the stake there and the holster at her hip the held her ax - a congratulatory gift from Willow. A gesture to prove she'd be okay on her own. "I'm good."
"You weren't really trained for this part."
"I think that's the point."
"I just want you to know, if you're not ready for this-"
"Xander," Maddie cut him off gently and with a grateful smile. "I think that's what we call 'on the job learning'."
The anxiety of his face softened and he opened the driver side door of the car. He heaved a sigh. "And they say teenagers never listen."
Maddie watched him get in his car, saying something in passing about donuts and coffee in the kitchens when she got back. He always told her before the other girls due to her tendency to stay up late rather than get up early.
Getting up early meant more time for Buffy to grill her for info, which she was already tired of. She didn't even show her the stake yet.
Maddie knew this was one of the smaller cemeteries and a generally less well kept one at that. Maybe that was why Buffy and the rest could afford to bury their dead here - because no one else really wanted to.
Dry, barely watered grass shuffled under her boots and she recalled her first patrol here, with her team. Marie, like a hurricane, slashing and spinning, taking down as many as she could. Charlie, beating them into submission before a hidden stake shot from her wrist. Terra and Em, with their insane luchadores style moves which had no right to actually work.
Terra wasn't back yet. Of course, she did have that nice rental and Buffy seemed fine with giving her some time off - like this was a job. Like this life didn't consume them.
Terra would be back in time, after she had a day or two to clear her head. Sometimes she just disappeared and Em never worried, so no one else worried either.
No one was really worried about anyone around here. Everyone felt like strangers, like...coworkers. People who only really cared on the clock. No one said they missed her and no one wanted to know about her time away. Em was busy training girls - she was a trainer now. Charlie was on tour - she was a back-up dancer, travelling across South America at the moment. Time didn't stop. People didn't stay the same. Maddie wasn't the same.
She checked her phone. The Pack are all asleep, she was sure of it, but she opened her messages again anyway.
Stiles ➔『 Can I call you tonight? 』
『 I need to patrol first. I'll text you when I'm on my way back. 』
Stiles ➔『 Good it's important. 』
『 Is something wrong? 』
『 Is there an emergency? 』
Stiles ➔『 No I just miss you. 』
Stiles ➔『 Is that weird to say? Are we at the level where we can say that? 』
Stiles ➔『 Not 'we' like we're a 'we' 』
Stiles ➔『 Unless we are. We haven't really talked about that. 』
『 I miss you too, Stiles. 』
This was at least the fifteenth time she opened her phone just to read it again. I just miss you. The warmth in her chest rose to her face and the backs of her ears. If this wasn't so important, she would've already called him, she would already be talking to him and allowing herself to pretend, just for a second, that he was here, too.
"If you pretend hard enough..."
The top of the hill was in sight and she stopped with the image of it came back to her in a cold, breathless moment. It was exactly the same - not exactly the same as the first time she patrolled here, exactly the same as it was on the other side. The perfect row of graves, the shallow blanket of trees off in the distance. She hauled herself up the hill as the tombstones came into focus.
A chill went through her when she found the one that had the word free scrawled across the epitaph when she saw it last. For a second, the ground beneath her fell away when she read the name.
Anne Marie Drake
Beloved Friend
"We shall meet in the place where there is no darkness."
Seeing her body fall made it real.
Reliving it at the brink of death made it real.
But this...
Seeing her grave, her name engraved and the ground beneath her unblemished, made it permanent.
Marie was dead. She was gone.
She was...free, maybe in the way she wanted.
Death didn't feel like freedom to Maddie. She wasn't sure what true freedom was or what it looked like or felt like. Maybe she would never get it, but she knew she'd never find it in the ground. She wouldn't want to find it alone.
Maddie sat down in the grass, cross legged and took the Reese's out of her pocket, placing it in front of the grave marker. She said nothing because there was nothing to say. The stone was cold on her back, even through her jacket, even at the brink of summer, as she watched the lights of the city below flicker to life, one by one.
Her eyes raised to the sky, clear and empty, light pollution hiding the stars from her. Part of her still expected it to crack open and for a shadow to be there as if it always was. The shadow of it loomed in her mind, overlaying the barren and decayed city with the one she knew. There was no pause, no true moment of rest. She was more aware of the phone in her pocket and the messages on it than before. The world stopped for no one. All we could ever have are the moments in between.
Her stare scaled downward, to the deep contrast of black and glowing light. The night, like all nights, was beautiful in its own way and full of sound. Below, the city was beginning its second life, the one that only happened in the rusted glow of the streets, filled with neon and smog. There would be as many people reveling in the haze of sweat and numbing adrenaline against the pounding of music the waking world never heard as there was fear and panic and the slow drain of life. Life, not just as the electricity that kept them moving and breathing, but the intangible thing that kept them hoping and laughing and dancing.
Maddie and Marie were just girls and there would always be girls like them, because they were all like them. Darkness and light. Fighting and dying and hoping the world was wrong, that they really could live forever and find home on the other side of hell.
For now, she would hope and maybe the rest would come later.
In the distance, there was a scratching sound bringing her back to the present and the gurgling beginning of a growl.
The thunder of clumsy footfalls began and became a steady beat. Closer and closer.
Her ax was still at her hip. Her stake was still up her sleeve.
Maybe it was a wild animal. A coyote or something.
It was probably a wild animal.
She grinned and stood up anyway.