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Title: Dimension Dementia
Part: 11
Author: SallyMcFine
Feedback: I love feedback. Bring it on!
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: All disclaimers apply
Thanks: To my beta, Mrs. McFine, for her editing and storyline skills that are out of this world.
Setting: AU/canon crossover
Summary: What happens when a shy, introverted girl is torn away from her world and deposited into a dimension full of vampires, demons, and...a girlfriend?
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Part 11 - Dreaming
Tara’s fingertips caressed the small of her back, sending shivers of delight up her spine. She gazed down into those expressive blue eyes as she shifted slightly. She was straddling Tara on the couch and as she resettled herself on the blonde’s thigh, she felt a delicious pressure it seemed she had never felt before.
Tara’s arms encircled her torso and pulled her in close for a lingering kiss. Willow returned the kiss with ardor and thrust her hips forward, seeking more of the thrilling friction. Her senses were filled with Tara – the smell of her hair, the taste of her mouth, the texture of her skin, the sounds of her breathing…
But then something seemed off – Tara’s body had less and less substance and then she just faded away until Willow was left alone kneeling on the cushions, gripping the back of the couch.
Willow made a noise of distress and clenched her hands, seeking the contact she had lost. She shook her head and opened her eyes, realizing that it was not a couch, but Buffy’s duvet that she held in a white-knuckled grip.
It was early and she groaned, realizing again that not only was she awake, but that she was still in the unfamiliar world. Her dream came crashing back into her consciousness and she inhaled with surprise as she realized that not only had she dreamed about Tara, but that it had been an erotic dream. Possibly the most erotic dream of her life.
She took stock of herself, blushing when she realized that her body had known it too. She felt a definite wetness between her legs, and her nipples were ultra-sensitive against the thin material of her T-shirt. She slipped out from under the duvet and padded down the hallway toward the bathroom.
Halfway there, the bathroom door opened and Tara emerged, tucking her sleep-tousled hair behind her ears. She wore a tank top and a pair of boxer shorts that clung to her curvaceous hips. The tank top had ridden up a bit and exposed a strip of her belly. With strands of her dream still floating through her consciousness, Willow gave Tara an unselfconscious smile and for a split second as they passed each other her eyes roamed appreciatively over the blonde’s body.
Willow’s eyes widened as she closed the door of the bathroom. Had she just...
leered at Tara? And more importantly, had Tara noticed? She hoped not.
That’s all kinds of wrong for about five different reasons.
She took a few deep breaths and used the bathroom, splashing cold water on her face and neck. Buffy’s duvet still kept her too warm at night, though she thought with a smidgen of guilt that her dream had probably contributed quite a bit to her current temperature.
Put it out of your mind.
She couldn’t help herself glancing down the hall at Tara’s room as she returned to bed. The door was firmly shut, not cracked at all as it usually was, and no light filtered out as it had the other morning. Willow slipped back into bed, hoping she could get some more sleep.
And maybe slip back into that dream – no!
Maybe…
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"Tara?" Buffy's voice floated up the stairs, tinged with a little concern.
"Yes," came the muffled reply through the door.
"What's going on?" Buffy asked, climbing the stairs. "Are you sick or something? Can I come in?" She opened the door to regard Tara curled up in her bed with a pillow on top of her head.
"I'm not sick," Tara replied, removing the pillow. She looked pale and tousled. Buffy looked sharply at her face, but her eyes weren't red or puffy.
"What's up, Tare?" she asked, sitting down at the foot of the bed.
Tara sighed. "Is Willow here?"
Buffy shook her head. "She and Dawn went out with Xander to pick up some breakfast - he said they'd meet us at the Magic Box. It's almost nine and I was getting worried. What's up? Did you two have a fight?"
Tara sat up in bed and pulled the pillow into her lap. "No, nothing like that. It's just...this morning I got up and went to the bathroom, and when I came out I passed Willow in the hall." She hesitated. "And she smiled at me."
Buffy looked at her uncomprehendingly. "And it upset you because she looks like your Willow, so you stayed in bed until she left the house?" Her tone left no doubt that she thought this was an overreaction.
Tara gave Buffy a look. "No, that's not it. It's that..." she trailed off.
"What?"
"She...she looked exactly the way my Willow does when she's...” Tara trailed off, then continued. “Her eyes were really dilated, she was flushed...and she looked at me. It was the same expression that Willow gives me...sometimes."
Buffy raised her eyebrows. "Ohhhh."
"I'm barely holding it together as it is, and I'm not sure if I can deal with it. If that's really what it was. It really threw me." Tara's tone was uncertain.
Buffy patted Tara's leg. "Well, the fastest way to make the problem go away is to figure out how to switch them back. So we should get going to the Magic Box. Unless you want to catch up with us later?"
Tara shook her head. "No, it's okay. Let me take a quick shower."
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Willow followed after Buffy as the Slayer opened the cemetery gate. She still wasn't sure what had made her volunteer to go with Buffy tonight, but after another day of research at the Magic Box she thought she would go crazy with cabin fever. Tara had been strangely quiet all through dinner and had announced she was going to bed early with a headache. When Buffy announced she was going to patrol Willow had asked if she could come along, and after a dubious glance the Slayer had agreed.
As she trudged along behind Buffy through the gate she started to have second thoughts. It was creepy in the cemetery. All the bloody, gory scenes from every horror movie she had ever watched started to replay themselves in her mind. And while this Buffy was certainly different from her Buffy, the slim blonde looked woefully short and small as she walked two steps in front of her. It was hard to imagine her giving any human a run for his money in a fight, much less a demon. And yes, this Buffy was different from her friend - but they shared enough mannerisms that Willow feared the girl would simply fold up if threatened.
She grasped the wooden stake that Buffy had handed her more firmly in her sweaty hand. Maybe they'd get lucky and not see any vampires at all.
Buffy glanced over at her as she closed the gate.
"Are you doing okay, Will?" It was the first question she had asked since they left the house - Buffy had seemed strangely pensive this evening.
Willow swallowed and nodded.
"It's creepier than I thought it would be," she said.
Buffy nodded. "It's really quiet in this cemetery most nights, which just adds to the scary factor, I think." She frowned. "Not that living with a teenager is any less scary, I have to say."
Willow wondered if this was the reason for Buffy's silence. "Did something happen between you and Dawn?"
Buffy shrugged and began to walk around the perimeter of the graveyard, and Willow fell into step behind her.
"Nothing out of the ordinary," she finally said. "It's just hard sometimes living with someone who's so negative all of the time." She sighed. "No, that's not even it. I don't know - I just feel like I can never say the right thing to her. And I feel like she expects me to have all the answers. Except when she clearly thinks I'm the stupidest person in the world, that is."
Willow considered this. "I think it would be hard to have someone else depending on you so much for everything."
Buffy glanced up sharply. At first Willow was afraid she had said the wrong thing, but she saw the Slayer's gaze was fixed on a nearby gravesite where the dirt looked fresh. "Do you hear that?"
Willow shook her head. "I don't hear anything."
Buffy hurried over to the side of the grave. "Stay behind me, Will."
As Willow watched, the fresh dirt began to move - just a little at first, but more and more was shoved aside. She felt her heart sink with dread as she saw a pale hand emerge from the ground and for a moment she feared she would wet her pants.
Buffy stood by the hand as an arm emerged, and then a shoulder. She stood in a casual hipshot pose, but Willow noticed that she was resting on the balls of her feet, ready to move at the slightest indication of activity.
With a growl, the vampire shouldered aside the remaining dirt and hoisted himself out of the ground. Clods of earth clung to his clothing, but Willow's gaze was drawn to the blackness of his eyes. Set in a very pale face, his eyes seemed even darker by contrast. He shook his head and suddenly noticed the woman standing in front of him.
The suddenness and ferocity of the change startled Willow. His face changed in an instant - his forehead wrinkled up and formed large, solid-looking bumps. For a crazy moment Willow wondered if mountains were formed in the same violent way this vampire's head had changed, but thoughts of plate tectonics left her mind when she noticed the fangs that now jutted from his mouth. They were larger than any human canines she had ever seen, and larger than most dogs' teeth too. She was convinced she and Buffy were both going to die then and there.
Buffy watched the vampire with an amused gaze. "Hungry, aren't you? So sorry, the drive-through is closed for the night."
With that quip, the Slayer became a small blonde blur. With a smooth side kick, her foot connected with the vampire's midsection, knocking him flat on his back. She spun around and landed on top of him with her knee pressing on his hip. Her arm carried forward with the momentum of her spin and the stake she gripped buried itself in the vampire's chest.
Willow watched agog as the demon suddenly exploded. One moment there was a large, ferocious fanged vampire lying on the ground, and the next he was simply gone. Buffy's knee that had so recently rested on his chest fell to the ground.
She stood up and turned around to face Willow. Willow wasn't sure what to say - she had just witnessed something amazing, she knew deep down. Not only was her mind still grappling with seeing a vampire - a real, live (well, dead – or was it undead?) vampire - she had seen a side of Buffy that she had
never seen before. She was sure that no human could have equaled the liquid motion that was Buffy during the woefully short fight - and the blonde hadn't even seemed to be trying. Willow fumbled with a variety of disjointed thoughts, not the least of which was that she was certainly in the presence of the Chosen One. Should she kneel?
Buffy seemed oblivious to Willow's consternation and instead brushed the vampire dust from her sweater and pants. "Darn it, I got a stain on these pants," she remarked. "It's so hard to get grass stains out of khaki."
The normalcy of her comment shook Willow out of her reverie and brought her back down to earth.
"If you rub it with warm water and vinegar before you wash the pants, that should get it out," Willow said, glancing at the stain. "It doesn't look like it's too deep into the fabric."
"I'll try that," Buffy said. "Or maybe I'll ask Tara to try it - she usually does most of the laundry."
For some reason Willow felt like she wanted to avoid talking about Tara. Fragments of her dream had lingered in her mind all day, and she was certain that if she talked about her, that it would be written all over her face.
The two resumed their stroll around the cemetery. Willow found herself slipping easily back into the interrupted conversation, picking up the thread where they had left off. A tiny part of her mind wondered if it was like this for all of the Slayer's friends - confronted with something that seemed impossible to believe, the mind simply adjusted and life went on.
"I guess it is hard to have someone depending on you all the time if you're not prepared for it," Buffy was saying. "I feel like Dawn expects me to know everything, and I don't feel like I know anything about real-life stuff like mortgages and plumbing. I used to depend on Mom to figure out all of that stuff, but now...I don't know. Giles is here, but that's a little different."
Willow nodded. "My Buffy, when Joyce died, I think she didn't know what to do. She moved in with me, and my parents became her surrogate parents, sort of. Like, my dad helped her figure out all the estate stuff and the sale of the house. I know she felt lonely a lot of the time, though."
Buffy looked over at her. "But she had you, right?"
"Yes, but that was a little different, I think, at the time. We got closer, but back then we had only been friends for a couple of years. She didn't talk about it much, but one night she told me that when her mom died, it was like the last living blood relative that she cared about was gone, and it made her feel like she was adrift." Willow bit her lip.
"That sounds so...sad," Buffy said.
"It was. I felt so bad for her. So that night - it was kind of childish, I guess, but it seemed like the right thing to do. We became blood sisters - we both cut our fingers and shook hands."
Buffy nodded sagely. "That's perfect, Will. Blood is important."
"Not to mention tasty," said a low, British voice at Willow's elbow.
Willow whirled and let out a shriek as her field of vision was taken up entirely by a vampire who stood less than five inches from her. Dressed all in black and thin as a whipcord, something about this vampire screamed of danger to her. He was clearly not a newborn - his smirk and relaxed stance spoke of hundreds of kills. His bleached blonde hair, which would have looked silly on a human of his build and coloring, only served to make him more menacing.
Without thinking, she drove the stake in her hand forward, aiming for his chest. She was acting on instinct and adrenaline, sure that if she stopped to think about what she was doing, she would freeze up.
As it was, she almost got him, but his reflexes were too quick. Though she had clearly caught him off guard by the surprised expression on his face, he grabbed her wrist, stopping the stake scant millimeters from the surface of his black T-shirt.
"Here now, what's this?" he said. His face morphed into vampire mode, and his grip on her wrist tightened momentarily. Then he let her go entirely as his face contorted with pain.
Willow took the opportunity to back away from him, and then screamed again as strong arms encircled her from behind.
"Buffy!" she shrieked.
"Easy, Will," Buffy said, releasing her. "It's okay."
"But he's a vampire!" Willow said. "Kill him!"
"I'm already dead, Red. What's gotten into her, Blondie?" the vampire said in a petulant tone, rubbing his forehead.
Buffy sighed. "Spike, Willow isn't...herself tonight. Willow, this is Spike - he's...well," she frowned. "An acquaintance and sometimes an ally, I guess."
Willow felt weak with the aftereffects of so much adrenaline in her system. "Oh," she said weakly. "Does he have a soul too, like Angel?"
Spike snorted. "Don't go comparing me to the likes of that do-gooder," he said.
Buffy bit her lip. "He doesn't have a soul, he has...a chip. It's complicated," she said, looking at Willow's confused expression. "I'll explain on the way home. Anyway, sometimes he helps out with the patrolling."
"Lose your memory, Red? Can't your girlfriend just magic it back in there?"
"Spike, this isn't really a good time," Buffy said. "I'll catch up with you tomorrow night, okay?" Her tone made it clear that it wasn't really up for discussion.
"Suit yourself," he said, offended. "Good luck with the amnesia, Red - sometimes I wish I had it too when I get to dwelling on the company I'm keeping these days." With a parting sneer, he strode off into the bushes and was soon out of sight.
"Are you okay?" Buffy asked.
Willow nodded. "I think so. Although I think I've had more than enough excitement to last me for a lifetime."
Buffy looked around at the cemetery. "I think I should take you back home. It seems pretty quiet tonight anyway. That vampire might be the only one for the night anyway."
Relieved, Willow nodded and they walked out the same gate they had come in by. As they left, Buffy filled Willow in on Spike - he was a vampire with clipped wings, the chip in his head preventing him from killing humans, though he could fight demons.
"I don't understand why you don't stake him, though," Willow said. "He's still evil, right? If the chip came out, he'd just as soon kill you all, and he was really bad before this chip happened?"
Buffy hedged. "Well, I guess so. Although we don't really know that for sure. Maybe now that he knows us, he wouldn't."
Willow's dubious expression made it clear what she thought of that logic, but she left it alone.
"So do you spend a lot of time with Spike?"
Buffy shrugged. "Depends. We're not bosom buddies or anything." She giggled. "But, I don't know - he's easy to talk to sometimes. About certain things."
When Willow didn't reply, but just looked at her expectantly, she continued.
"Well..." she said. "You know how we've said a couple of times that I was sick, and that's why Willow and Tara moved in?" Willow nodded. "I wasn't sick, actually. I was dead."
Willow's jaw dropped. For a crazy instant, she thought Buffy would morph into vamp face and say a final sentence like
And soon you'll be dead too before she bit her neck and drained the life out of her, just like in a B movie. Instead the Slayer gave Willow a quick summary of how she had died saving Dawn in the fight against Glory, and that after some months Willow had resurrected her.
"So...it's been a bit of an adjustment," Buffy summed up. "And I don't really feel like I can talk to Will about it, because she went to all that trouble. What would I say, I wish you had just left me dead? Thanks, but no thanks? So Spike's a good listener about stuff like that." She thrust her hands into the pockets of her jackets as they walked.
Willow was silent for a moment, and then turned to Buffy. "I'm so sorry you went through all that and you couldn't talk to your friends about it," she said, and gave the Slayer a hug.
Buffy returned the hug hesitantly but then more firmly.
"Thank you for listening," she said.
Willow nodded. "Buffy always said she wished she had a sister," she said. "After her mom died, I mean. That's part of why we did the blood sister thing. And you do have a sister, and you died for her. I think that's the kind of bond that my Buffy wishes she had with someone. Other than me, I mean."
Buffy didn't reply, but her face took on a thoughtful expression as they walked the final blocks to the Summers house.
They let themselves in to the darkened first floor and said goodnight.
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As Willow settled into Buffy's bed, she thought briefly about the night's events, but soon her mind wandered back to Tara. She had hardly seen or talked to her all day, and yet now that she was alone in bed it seemed like she could think of nothing else. As she closed her eyes and tried to sleep, a fantasy began to take shape in her mind.
What if I get stuck here forever, and I live here in Buffy's house, and one day Tara and I are alone, and it's raining outside, and...
Her eyes snapped open. Was she really starting to have a daydream about her doppelganger's girlfriend? She, who had never daydreamed about women that way before in her life? Although if she was going to be completely honest with herself, she was beginning to question herself a bit. She had always wondered when she and Danny were making out if she was supposed to be more
excited about it. Not to mention that it was probably inappropriate to fantasize about someone else's girlfriend. Even if it was her own girlfriend, albeit her doppelganger from another universe.
"This makes my head hurt," she muttered, closing her eyes again.
Maybe it's okay, as long as nobody knows about it. I'm certainly not going to tell anyone...
Thanks for reading and commenting!
The story is mostly about the parallelism between the two people and worlds, with an extra focus on this Willow’s journey from within to without, as it were.
I've stopped trying to think ahead because I'm so comfortable letting you take the lead and guide us to each new development, I don't want to overthink.