herotypical | voice + action ✪ there must be some way to bring the hero home

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voice + action ✪ there must be some way to bring the hero home

[ after a week of agonizing combat, buffy summers returns home with only exhaustion on her mind. despite all the excitement and crisis, there's little left to do other than collapse onto her bed and fall into a sleep fit for a weary, worn-out soul. morning sees her feeling no less -- shudder -- zombieish. the horror of the last week is bone-and-marrow deep and has yet to fully make itself known in her system. the slayer is running on auxillery humanity, stringing herself along from second to second until she can find a friendly face. find willow and...

and all she finds is an empty room. an empty closet. empty drawers. her best friend is gone. deported while she wasn't even looking. come the afternoon, after she's gotten the first onslaught of emotions out of her system, buffy sits alone on the empty bed. she addresses her journal: ]

Willow and I have this game we like to play. Willow Rosenberg. She was in town...but now she's not. [ a pause allows buffy to catch her breath. to stay strong. ] We call it 'Anywhere But Here' -- self-explanatory, really. Pick a fantasty-elsewhere to be and a fantasy-someone to share it with. I'm not talking about the obvious ones: home or family or anything even remotely whiffing of responsibility. I'm talking about fun. I'm talking about pure escapism. I'm talking Daniel Craig on the beach or Amy Yip at the waterpark.

I'll go first. Show you how it's done. [ but which escape route from reality should she take? ] The '88 Winter Olympics. The Saddledome. Calgary, of all places. Brian Boitano is taking the time to personally skate me through his gold medal routine. Perhaps there's hot chocolate involved. I, being made entirely of my own imagination, copy each move perfectly.

Got it? Good. Because now it's your turn.

[ when her broken little tribute to an absent friend is finished, she'll be searching out her injured pirate (wherever he may be convalescing) and it's off to good spirits, where she can be found working a shift behind the bar. ]

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[ a half-smirk. ice and drink rattle and swish as she gives the cocktail a lazy shake. ]

That so? God. I can't figure out whether it's creepy or comforting to be reminded that people've been here a whole year more than me. I already feel so...[ veteranish. it'll be four years come may. ]

I'd say sorry, but...

[ when has that ever helped, here? ]

[The four-year mark was also rougher than this one. She just can't seem to figure out why.]

That's okay, I keep forgetting that there're people who have been here only a year less than me. So it works out.

[ finally, she pours two low glasses about half-way full of vodka and orange juice. maybe a dash of grenadine in there to make it look pretty.

and a cherry on top. ]

Maybe...maybe the official year count gets a little hazy beyond the third. I don't know. Better minds than mind are probably stumped.

[ she passes one glass over to sheena. ]

Hah, yeah, maybe. [Things about time and progress have been on her mind lately. Sheena picks up the glass and sips the result.] Hey, not bad. I dunno if I'd've pick orange juice on my own.

See. I like mixing with OJ 'cause it masks the booze without all those pesky, tummy-upsetting bubbles. Like in soda.

Yeah but isn't some orange juice kinda sour?

[Not this one. This one's great. A weird mix of breakfasty and...drinking.]

...See the bit of red? [ she swirls her glass, disturbing a reddish haze amongst the orange. like a sunset in a glass. ] That's a super sugary syrup. It kinda cuts through the worst of the sour. Old bartender's trick.

Yeah, that'll do it I guess.

[Sheena takes one very long sip. It isn't the first time she's come to Good Spirits outside of an experiment, but it feels like it.]

It's gotta be rough to talk about, but you can if you wanna. [She's counting on Buffy to pick up on the subject change.]

I'm afraid there's not much to say. Just another lousy battlefield with hard choices and harder realities. I think this was the bloodiest one yet, Sheena.

[ buffy doesn't know sheena well, but she knows her well enough to know the ninja didn't deserve any sugarcoating. ]

Yeah? Where'd you end up going?

Another enclosure. Roughly the same size as us only hella more advanced. [ a long drink of her screwdriver. eyes closed. ]

It was called Vaskoth. Probably still is, though I'm not sure it's gonna be habitable again for a long time.

[Sheena just watches her for a few moments. She's seen that kind of look and posture before.]

So you guys...lost? It got destroyed?

[ a lidded glance. ]

Not quite. Or -- yes. The population was more than decimated. But it wasn't the Third Party that was the problem. There was a sickness...

Our side cured it, in the end. Just in time. But also way way too late.

Not in time for everybody. [Whoa. Wow. ...Yeah, that was bad.] Were you...fighting on top of it? Like the Third Party was still attacking?

At first? Y-yeah. But soon enough, it was just everyone against the infected.

[ she feels gross even in saying it. ]

Want me to stop asking?

[Totally serious. She will drop it so fast it leaves a hole in the floor if Buffy says enough is enough.]

Y-yeah, it's...

[ she can't believe she's saying this. buffy's never quite felt this way before. ] Maybe it's a little too soon?

Okay. I get that. Sorry for pushing it.

...It's not your responsibility to apologize. Seriously. I'd probably ask questions, too, if the situation was reversed.

[ another sip. ] Give it time. Someone with cooler blood than mine will manage a report on the usual frequencies. I'm guessing.

Maybe I don't wanna hear some stupid cold detached report. [There are plenty of those to go around already. Nothing against your suggestion of it, Buffy. They do nothing for her, that's all.]

[ people grow detached for a reason. that's what she wants to say. she wants to unpack the fact that those reporting might not be able to say a thing should they invest too deeply in the terror. even buffy required distance just to be here at work. but... ]

Then I...I don't know how to help you. [ a pinched expression. apologetic. ]

[Well that must have come out wrong. Sheena looks right at Buffy until the slayer looks back.]

You don't have to help me. I think you did enough already. Really, okay? A weird orange juice alcohol drink is going into "more than enough" territory.

[ a tight half-smile of submission. she submits to sheena's insistence. ]

It's called a screwdriver. I mean -- if you ever want to order it again.

Because the chances of me coming in here and really really wanting to drink are huge, right?

[Maybe relieving the tension this way isn't working. She just can't stop trying, and she's finished her mini screwdriver by now. But her point should be pretty clear - she came to check on somebody, not to drink.]

Fair enough. [ she sees the point and exploits it: ] But now you know what to order when you're otherwise trying to be sly.

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